


Layers

by Pixel_Runner



Series: Building Empire [11]
Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Cannibalism, Character with PTSD, F-bombs, Hurt/Comfort, Knitting, Low Hanging Tropes, Masturbation, Mental Health Issues, Multi, Oral Sex, Panic Attatcks, Past Abuse, Past Rape/Non-con, Plot, Puppy Piles, Revenge, Running, Self-Rescuing Princess, Slice of Life, Stick A Fork In It Because It's Done, Threesome - F/M/M, Will Write For Comments, not that much smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-07
Updated: 2017-09-13
Packaged: 2018-12-12 09:31:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 23
Words: 32,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11734278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pixel_Runner/pseuds/Pixel_Runner
Summary: Yondu and Kraglin get back after Nova Records.  Takes place immediately after Moult





	1. Nightmares

Yondo dragged his tired ass off the Milano.  Realistically, the raid had gone well.  Except for the part where some Kree girl had tried to rip out Quill’s thorax.

 

Still, Andrei had used the field med kit to clean it up.  It didn’t look like it would need the girl’s attention.  He had read the file on his way back to the Eclector.  It hadn’t made him happy.  All he wanted to do right now was find the bastard and rip out his spleen.  Failing that, he wanted to find the girl and hold her tight and promise that would never, NEVER happen again.

 

With Kraglin walking in his shadow, Yondu made his way to the medway, where apparently there was an orgy going on.  

 

“What the Hel?”

 

The electosmith (who’s name escaped him) sat up suddenly.  Knix pulled his face out of the man’s- ugh, deal with THAT in the morning- lap and stepped forward standing over her.  The rest of the boys followed suit.  Interesting.

 

“Where the fuck is my medic?”

 

“Captain! I can-“ Brahl started.

 

“Save it!  Where is my medic?”

 

"In the Doctor’s quarters.” one of the carnies answered.  Yondu didn’t know which one.  Brahl had the split ear.  Knix had the cheek scar, all the others all looked the same to him.

 

“Fine.”  He turned to leave.  “As you were.” he said with a smirk.

 

Without the bandages, his palm opened the door to Amelia’s room, but the only person he could see in the bed was Tullk.  Laying on his side and watching the door.

 

“Did you get it, Boss?”

 

“Yeah. We got it. Would’ve been easier with Dave along.”

 

“So next time, don’t run him off.”

 

“I dint.”

 

“No. You just threatened to leave a member of her family behind, so she felt obligated to rescue him. Then you got all murder looking when said rescue involved the gir— woman you absolutely DO NOT love kissing someone else.” Kraglin said.

 

“Shut it, Kragles.”

 

“If you two make me laugh, she will wake up.”

 

“Why you in bed with her?” Yondu demanded, but quietly.

 

“I’m guarding her, Boss.   Keeping myself between her and the world and the nightmares.”

 

Yondu grunted and sat down to take off his boots.

 

Kraglin said, “Yeah, she gets those.”

 

Yondu stripped down to his undies and tried not to think about why she had nightmares.  He crawled into bed and tried to pull her off Tullk. She cried out and clung tighter.  He frowned.

 

“Hey, Doc?  You got to let go.  Yondu’s back.  Come, let go, I’ll leave you with your family.”

 

Amelia let go of his shirt with her top hand and wrapped that arm around his chest instead.  The end result was that she was squished even tighter up against him.  Yondu considered this and put his hand on her shoulder to try to give her a little shake.  Kraglin caught his wrist.

 

“She's fine like that.  Don’t you wake her up and wreck her sleep because YOU’RE upset about what we found out.  We comfort her.”  Then Kraglin stripped and spooned up behind her.  

 

Yondu considered this before taking the outside edge.

 

Everyone woke when Amelia made a little squeak of fear in her sleep.  Tullk tried to pull away to roll over, but she tightened her grip again and pressed her face more firmly into his back.  Kraglin rubbed her back and said, “It’s ok, you’re safe.  I got you.”

 

Yondu listened to her whimper through all of this then sat up and turned on the lights.  “Wake up!”

 

Amelia jerked awake, flung herself up into sitting and looked around the room.  Once she recognized where she was, she flopped back down on the bed.  She lay there staring at the ceiling for a moment.  After a moment she said, “Hey! You’re back!  How was the meeting?”

 

They just looked blankly at her.

 

“Quinlan said you had an emergency meeting on a moon or something.”

 

That jogged Yondu’s memory.  “Quinlan’s a girl!”

 

Amelia closed her eyes.  “Quinlan is presenting as male.  I am not going to question that.  There is a lot of diversity in reproductive systems out there.  For example, Winch-“

 

“Whoa! Stop!” Kraglin said.

 

“We don’t talk about what Winch has in his pants.” said Yondu firmly.

 

“Ever.” Kraglin added.

 

Tullk was grinning and trying not to laugh.

 

“My point is, Quinlan’s gender is none of my - OUR!- concern.”

 

“Maybe not, but her sex is.  Especially when she’s having it with a pack of Achernonians in my - your med bay.” Yondu said.

 

Tullk and Amelia both sat up for that one.  “Like, actual, penetrative sex?” Amelia asked, "Or just licking?”

 

“We only saw the licking part.” Kraglin said.

 

Amelia relaxed and leaned back against Tullk for a moment.  “Good.  That should make Brahl feel better about me continually turning him down.”

 

Tullk shrugged.  “You eating the skin of his shoulders helped with that too.  And the part where you fell asleep on the floor.”

 

“You ate his skin?” Kraglin asked, going a little green.

 

“Yes.  I also sliced people open, cut into their intestines and dug through their fecal matter to find and remove parasites before cleaning up and closing them back up again.  My job is going to be disgusting.  I’m going to need to to be OK with that.”

 

“Oh.”  Kraglin forced himself to relax.  “That was different.”

 

Amelia just shrugged.  “I am tired.  Can someone turn out the lights?”

 

“Tullk can get them on his way out.”  Yondu said.

 

“It’s a big bed.” Amelia suggested.

 

“Watching the boys licking that…. man, gave me ideas.  You don’t like being watched.”

 

“Tullk has spend the last six days taking care of me.  I don’t like kicking him out of bed either.”

 

Yondu frowned.  Kraglin decided it was time to intercede.  “It weren’t a good meeting, ‘Melia.  Captain could use some cu… contact.”

 

“Are you trying to avoid the word cuddles?”

 

Kraglin looked at Tullk and shrugged.

 

Amelia sighed.  “Come here.  I am pretty nearly touched out, but let’s see what we can do.”  She yawned and had Yondu lay on his back.  She crawled on top of him and used his chest as a pillow.  Tullk, crawled up and put his head on Yondu’s shoulder and started rubbing Amelia’s back.  Kraglin was somewhat taken aback by this, but quickly decided to follow suit on the other side.

 

Yondu considered this.  It weren’t so bad.  He wasn’t sure how Kraglin was going to handle it.  He wouldn’t have thought it would be the girl’s idea.  But he had just left her with Tullk for the last few days.  It wasn’t the plan.  But it was how things worked out.  “Six whole days of watching those boys lick each other, huh?”

 

“Ummm hmm.”

 

“You let any of ‘em have a taste?”

 

“No.”

 

“Huh.  What about Tullk?”

 

Yawn, “He was very well behaved.”

 

“Or Quinlan who might be a girl?  You let him?”

 

“Didn’t even come up.  Quinlan and Knix are a thing now, I think.”

 

“Huh.” Yondu filed that away for future reference.  “You spend all the time creaming yur panties?”

 

“Honestly after a while, I just stopped paying attention.”.  Amelia felt Yondu’s dick twitch against her belly where she was laying on him.  “I don’t think I can right now.”

 

“I really wanna taste you.” He hesitated. "I'm betting so does everyone else."

 

Tullk carefully licked Amelia’s shoulder.  She blushed but didn't pull away.  

 

Kraglin hated to be the voice of reason.  “You don't have to.  You can just tell him no.”

 

Amelia turned and looked at him. Kraglin’s pupils were huge and he was quite a bit more pink than usual.  “You were all sleeping.” He said. “And now we're askin for stuff that you might not want and just cuz the Captain ain't been paying attention don't mean I ain't noticed that we always snuggle and sleep in yur bed but we never actually fucks in it.”

 

Yondu felt his chest get warm as she blushed at that.

 

“Is that for you or for the Boss or both?” Tullk asked.

 

“For me. I need a space that isn’t….”  she stopped and started to crawl off of Yondu, who caught her for a moment before letting go.  “I don’t know.”

 

Tullk watched her for a moment.  “A comfortable space that isn’t for making other people happy.”

 

“Maybe?  I mean they make me happy too-“

 

“Unless Cap’n gets some weird hang up about sex again.” Kraglin says.  “Which he does fair often.”

 

Amelia didn’t say anything but she nodded.

 

“Doc?  As much as I do want to taste you, I’m not pushing you for that.  It would even be nice just to watch you cum.  I bet you smell good and your toes get all scrunchy.”  Tullk stopped and watched her for a moment.  “But Yondu keeps asking and you haven’t actually said yes.”

 

“I can’t.  I need some time to process this.  I mean the whole…. everyone.  That is kind of scary.  Having you all here while I sleep was a push, but...  You are all good at making me feel safe.”

 

Tullk’s mind raced.  Kraglin and Yondu smelled really upset.  Angry.  So angry and grief. And Yondu was pushing for… not sex.  He was asking for orgasms for Amelia, really.  It smelled more like a territorial thing.  He knew what they had gone looking for.  He knew what she looked like when she got here.  This was Yondu wanting to reclaim Amelia and try to erase whatever he had learned.

 

It didn’t work that way.

 

But Yondu wasn’t going to hurt her and if the Boss needed some comfort…

 

“Kraglin, why don’t we go get some snacks for everyone.  I get the feeling that the Boss could do with a moment alone with the Doc.”


	2. Two Ravagers in a Hallway

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Today's offering features pants. As in the British usage of the word.
> 
> I may add a couple hundred more words later, but this is my Hour Of Writing for today.

Kraglin followed Tullk out into the hallway.  As soon as the door closed he shoved him from behind.  Tullk stumbled a little but didn’t bounce off the opposite wall as Kraglin had been hoping.  “What the actual fuck?” he demanded.

 

Tullk turned on him, “Boss has had me guarding her for months.  Don't tell me you both were stupid enough to think that he could leave me guarding his mate for that long and expect me to stay dispassionate about it?  Even when she is so angry she can hardly look at me, she is never cruel.  Hell, Yondu made her feel like crap and revenge was a stupid plastic cone and excellent health care.  Think about that!  She could have left him to pick at his hands until they got infected.  He wouldn’t have stopped to take care of that. Then what?  Blisters that bad, you know what would have happened, so say it.”

 

Kraglin frowned.  “He would have either lost his hands or he would have gone septic.”

 

“Yeah.  And hating him, she still made sure that didn’t happen.  She was so upset she could hardly stand to be in the same room as him and she still made sure his hands were clean and safe and properly bandaged so he could actually use them.  How can you not love someone like that?”

 

Tullk took a breath before continuing, “Doc has had a complicated life. She's going to need things from each of us that the others just can't provide.”

 

That pissed Kraglin off. “Wut you gonna give her that we can't?” he demanded. 

 

“Consistency.” Tullk replied promptly. “Don't even try to tell me she is getting that from the Boss.”

 

Kraglin sagged. He wasn't expecting a valid answer. There wasn't really anything he could say to that except, “She got me for that.”

 

“No. Yondu has you for that. It was the thing I couldn't give him. Not the way he needed. She has you for comfort when the Boss is inconsistent. I can't be that for her. My instinct would be to steal her. You can help make it ok.  Boss is her protector.  She needs all of that.”

 

Kraglin still wanted to punch Tullk in the face, but the only thing that would do would be maybe break his hand.  He stood there glaring at the other man. 

 

There was a gasp and a cough from down the hallway.  They turned to see Tek pushing a cart around the corner. “Um. Excuse me. Sorry! Don't mean to interrupt!”  He squeezed past them. “Thank you!  I'll just let you get back to standing in the hallway.” He started to rush, “Staring at each other.”  He was moving quite quickly now. “In your underwear!”  There was a laugh as he disappeared around the next corner. 

 

“Oh for fucks sake!” Kraglin said and he turned to go back into Amelia's room. 

 

Tullk caught his hand an inch from the control panel. “You think they're done?”

 

Kraglin hesitated.  “I'm standing in the hallway in my shorts.”

 

“Yeah? So am I. I am also going down 16 floors to the gardens and getting the Doc some fruit. You can run and hide if you're too embarrassed.”

 

——

 

Yondu gently pulled Amelia into his lap after the boys had left. He held her to his chest and tucked his face into the soft corner of her neck. He just sat there, motionless for a while, breathing in her smell.  He might not have Tullk's nose, but she smelled warm and clean and sleepy. 

 

She hugged him back. 

 

“Hey,” she said, “It's ok.  You made it back safe.” 

 

She was trying to be comforting.  It almost made Yondu snort. 

 

“Can you tell me what happened?” She asked. 

 

No. Yondu thought. I still can't tell what happened but reading the aftermath was horrible. “Ran into some Kree slavers.  I weren't expecting that. I killed them all and dumped their cargo on Xandar.  They'll be taken care of there. There were girls with little squallers on that ship.”

 

Amelia rubbed his back. “And you saved them.”

 

“Yeah. Don't go gossiping that around. Crew’ll think I gone soft.”

 

“I won't.”

 

“I ain't never letting you go back to the slavers. Yur mine. I'll keep you safe.”

 

“I know.”

 

“Whatever happened before I got you, it ain't gonna happen again.”

 

Amelia didn't really know what to say to that. She choked up a little, tears starting to well. “Thank you.”

 

“I ain't no angel, but you don't got nothing to fear from me.”

 

Amelia nodded and just let him talk. He had her cradled against him like he was afraid to let go. In the privacy of her own head, she thought to herself, whatever he may say, this feels a lot like love.

 

——

 

Walking through the corridors with Tullk was interesting.  Kraglin was a little self conscious.  They ket running into crew who would look shocked then snicker.  Tullk just ignored them.  Kraglin tried to follow that lead.

 

“Hey!  Wait!” he said, suddenly realizing where they were.  “We can’t be down here!”

 

“Yeah, because the gardens are guarded by a fearsome pack of Achernonians who have no interest in raiding the food supply but will absolutely feast on any trespassers!”

 

“Uh, yeah.”

 

"Unless they are still having a post moult orgy in the medbay.  Or you happen to be with the quartermaster, who is authorized to be here.”

 

“Oh. Right.”

 

They walked past the algae bins that made the base food for the average grunt on the ship and over to the proper fruit and veg grown for the officers and anyone willing to pay a little extra for it.  Tullk found the almost strawberries and picked a double handful into his shirt. “OK.  Let’s go.”

 

As they were walking back to Amelia's room Kraglin asked. “She ain’t fucking you, so what are you getting out of this?”

 

Tullk laughed.  “Not the same as you, who needs a drinking buddy you don't have to strain yourself pumping out the testosterone around, trying to prove you aren’t less because you are warming Captain’s bed.  Not the same as the Boss, who wants something small and helpless to protect to try to make up for no one protecting him or all those kiddies he took to their deaths.  No, I get someone who looks at me like a person and not a thing.  But also someone who can lead and does it very well.  Better than the Boss, to be honest.  He may want to hand off to Quill, but he would be better handing off to her.”

 

Kraglin snorted, “ ‘Melia’s a nice girl an’ all, but she couldn’t keep this mob in line.”

 

“No? She stared down Brahl yesterday.  Or the day before.  It’s hard to tell at this point in the night.” Tullk paused to think for a moment.  “Speaking of drinking buddies, you got anything in your stash that she likes?”

 

“Yeah… I could find something.”

 

——

 

By the time Tullk and Kraglin got back to the room, Amelia and Yondu were asleep, curled up tight around each other.  Tullk set the fruit on the table, pulled off his stained shirt and curled up between the pair and the door.

 

Kraglin stared at him. “Just like that?”

 

“Yup.  Just like that.  Now, go to sleep, Kraggles.”

 

“Fuck.  Don't call me that in front of her!”  

 

“Too late.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come on show your love now!


	3. People are Complicated

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorting out the time line for tomorrow's adventure

Amelia woke up covered in people. If someone had asked what she would think of that a month ago, she would have said that was a very scary idea.  But under the circumstances it was ok. Here and now, this felt comfortable. 

 

She wiggled to get up and legged it up the secret stairs to the medbay to use the toilet.  She had a shower while she was up there and came back down the stairs wrapped in a towel.  Yondu and Kraglin were dressed and sitting in her chairs.  Tullk was no where to be seen.  She looked at Yondu and frowned.

 

“He took really good care of me while I was working on the moult.  Please tell me you were at least polite when you ran him off.”

 

“He’s a glorified guard dog.  I don’t have to be polite.”

 

Amelia didn’t say anything. She got dressed.  “Aw! Yondu!  You brought me strawberries!  That is so nice!”

 

Yondu frowned.  “Those aren’t from me.”  

 

She looked at Kraglin who shook his head. “O…kay.  What are the political ramifications of me eating these?  Because they look delicious.”

 

“I don’t wanna share you, but I don’t give a fuck if you eat those.”

 

Kraglin cleared his throat.  “It’s Ok to be friends with Tullk.  He ain’t us.  Maybe sometimes you need some one to complain about us to.  Just….  don’t throw us away because he’s a better talker than we is.”

 

Amelia frowned but nodded.  “Why would you think I would throw you away?  I love you. Tullk is a nice guy.  I like spending time with him, but… _Have you heard of the friend zone?  No?  It’s something we talk about back home.  That guy you like spending time with, but aren’t interested in sexually._ ”

 

They both looked skeptical.  “I don’t think that’s a thing.  If I’m spending time with a g- woman, I will at least think about what it would be like to fuck her.” Kraglin said.

 

Amelia said, “That isn't the same as seriously considering doing it.”

 

They both shrugged.

 

Amelia looked worried.  “I would be unhappy with you bringing anyone else into this relationship without unanimous agreement before hand.  I am certainly not going to do that to either of you.”

 

They both relaxed.  “I ain’t totally callin’ veto on Tullk.” Kraglin said.  “The man has some good insights.  I just want us to be sorted out first.  We can't add someone when the Cap’n is all… weird about stuff.”

 

“I ain’t weird about no stuff!”

 

They both ignored him.

 

“Well, are you going to help me eat these strawberries?” Amelia asked.

 

And they did.

 

——

 

Amelia got on with trying to get her medic certificate from Xandar.  Yondu got on with the business of being a Ravager.  He had the added job of trying to find Azul.  This was a problem because he didn’t tell the whole crew what he was doing.  He didn’t want someone to let it slip to Amelia.

 

The interesting part had been showing the file to Tullk.

 

The man went very quiet.  Then he nodded curtly and left the room.

 

Dave came back from his vacation.  He and Tullk got up to something in the hydroponic gardens.  The carnies were in on it.  Yondu just didn’t ask.  He was aware of Dave’s botany habit, but since the plant itself didn’t work on most of the crew and Dave had been respectful of his request not to supply Peter, Yondu just ignored it.  The more interesting thing was that he brought Amelia a present.

 

Yondu was starting to feel a bit nervous about that.  The count (if he was keeping track) was:

 

Dave- two pendants, a chain, a box of yarn and a really amazing hand made blanket.

 

Yondu - clothes, and a box of now used up yarn, some pointy sticks.

 

Kraglin - a music player

 

Czar - her favourite boots

 

He wasn't entirely sure the clothes counted and he was ignoring the poison oak as an attempted present.  He was prepared to pretend that never happened.

 

Her ears had been pierced at some point.  He was seriously thinking about asked her to wear his earrings.  He just wasn’t prepared for her to say no.  Or for her to ask for details.  There was no way he was prepared to explain the cultural significance of that gift.

 

Czar was firm in his suggestion that best present would be making her ex husband watch as Yondu served her a plate of the Kree’s testicles. 

 

Kraglin wasn't so sure that was the best idea.  He and Tullk were advocating for letting the crew play and just telling her when it was over.  

 

Dave, once he was caught up on the situation, disagreed with both options. “There is a big difference between asking for a clean kill and asking for some one to be tortured,” he pointed out.

 

They showed him the file.

 

“Oh.”  He thought for a moment.  “I can see where you are coming from, but you have to own that fact that whatever you are doing to him, you are doing to make you feel better.  It won’t actually change what happened.”

 

“I will feel better knowing that he got to experience the pain and fear that his actions inflicted on her.”  Czar said.  

 

But Tullk looked thoughtful at that.

 

So far, the point was moot.  They had to find him first.

 

In the mean time, the medic had starting trying to rearrange things to suit herself.  Some of it, Yondu didn’t mind.  Like where she and Tullk started cooking for the four of them one day out of seven.  It was always better than what the cafeteria had on offer

 

Some of it made him less happy.  Like the whole running thing..  he had been watching the monitors as the carnies caught up to her.  Brahl dived at her, wrapped his arms around her torso and spun as they crashed to the floor so that his body took most of the impact.  She still scuffed her knee and had the wind knocked out of her. But the worst part was where her shoulder had dragged along the floor. It was scrapped up and full of grit.  She had tried to treat it herself before caving and letting Yondu do it.

 

He gritted his teeth with every piece of debris he pulled out of her shoulder.

 

“It was an accident,” she said.

 

He didn't say anything.

 

“Next time-“

 

“No.  No next time.”

 

“Yondu.  I need something physical to do.  I’m not cleaning with the housekeeping team any more.  I’m going twitchy from spending too much time sitting.   You won’t let me use the training room-“

 

“Over my dead body will you be using the training room!”

 

“Right!  So that leaves combat training with Tullk, which you don’t like or running with Brahl.”

 

“I don’t like him chasing you.”

 

“OK.  I’ll see what I can come up with.”

 

This wasn't right.  There was a reason he didn’t hire women.  Amelia all smelling good with her buttery soft skin was just too damn vulnerable.  If he was a decent man, he'd dump her on Xandar and let her get on with being a medic.   Yondu was terrible at doing the right thing.  His hands shook a little as he tried to activate the synthetic skin.

 

“It’s isn't bad enough for that.” She protested.

 

“We have it.  You’ll use it.” He grunted.

 

Amelia looked up to see Tullk watching her. “Well?”

 

He gave her a little smile.  “Ain’t everyday I get to see the medic without her shirt on.  Plus the boss will be wanting the antiseptic spray before he puts that on.”

 

“Get out!” 

 

“It really isn’t that bad.  I’ve had worse road rash falling off my bike.” Amelia said, ignoring Yondu.

 

“Brahl is really sorry.”

 

“It’s fine.  It was an accident.  He actually did a very impressive tuck and roll.  We just didn’t stick the landing.”

 

“I’m going to kill him.” It was even more scary because Yondu said it in a flat voice with no anger or malice.  It was just a simple statement of inevitable facts.

 

Tullk went quiet.  Amelia stiffened.  “I don’t want that.” She turned to look at Yondu.  “Promise me you won’t!”

 

Yondu ignored her.  Amelia put her hand on his cheek.  “Yondu, Brahl and the carnies are my friends.  I don’t want them dead!  I will be really upset if anything happens to them!  As training accidents go, this is really minor.”

 

“Yur bleedin’”

 

“From a scratch.  It’s fine.  It would heal up in a week even without the synth skin.  They were helping me because I asked them to.  If you go after them, no one will help me because they will be too afraid of upsetting you.  Please.  I need this.”

 

“Fine.”

 

Amelia hugged him and put her face in the crook of his neck.  She had been right when she said that was the comforting spot.  He held her around her waist and just enjoyed the contact for a moment.  It weren’t that he was happy she were safe.  It was jus…  He was comforting her, cuz she had a scare and all.

 

He caught Tullk watching them. “We land on Akhaten in 17 hours.  See if you can get a lead on that spare part we is looking for.”

 

Amelia sat up.  “I thought we were going to Xandar after Knowhere.”

 

“Change of plans.  We need to track soming down.” Yondu hesitated.  “Why you so anxious to get Xandar anyway?”

 

“It’s where Quinlan is going.  He needs to get some medical care there in the next couple of months and we have already been delayed four times.”

 

“Medical care is your job.  So do it.”  That came out way harsher than he intended.

 

“I can’t do everything here, Yondu.  We aren’t stocked for that.  I don't want anything to happen to Quinlan either.”

 

“If he’s in a rush, he can hire a shuttle on Akhaten.”

 

“Yondu-“

 

“That's it!  Everyone back to work!”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I write for comments. So, you know... say something.


	4. That Weren't in The Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Quinlan's back hurts.

Quinlan's back was killing her.  It had been spasming all day.  The rebuilt chair Jai had fixed up for her had been great up to now, but, man, today was brutal.  She tried to stretch.  It did helped for a minute then the muscle spasm was back.  

 

Ugh.  

 

She set down the board she was soldering and went for a walk.

 

Last week maintenance had evacuated the seventeenth deck because of plumbing problems.  Every one was doubled up and complaining about it.  That was ridiculous.  Before the mutiny they were four to a room and anyone competent spent a big chunk of their day cleaning up after those who weren’t.  Now they were three to a room and there was actually less work.

 

So what if they had to share for a little while?  It wasn't that bad.  Mind you, her perspective was slightly skewed since she had moved in with the carnies.  There weren’t any beds, just a pile of sleeping furs and all the back rubs she could dream of.

 

The boys were everything her husband wasn’t.  It had been an arranged marriage.  He was not fond of her.  He wasn't cruel, but he was more than twice her age and not particularly interested in spending time with her.  Out side of the obvious.

 

Knix was kind and doting and the others had welcomed her in to their pack like it was the most natural thing in the world.

 

Lunch had tasted funny.  Maybe her not feeling good was food poisoning.

 

——

 

Ugh! Definitely food poisoning!  She had made it to the head in time, but it had been a near thing.  Sick out both ends, until there was nothing left to lose.  Time for a shower.

 

——

 

Quinlan hadn't wanted to get out of the shower, but it had been twenty minutes.  Her back still hurt and the boys would be looking for her.  She got dressed and headed towards their room.

 

Twelve flights of stairs.  Fuck!  Why didn’t this place have an elevator?  No! It had to be all rugged industrial with cat walks and gang planks and horrible, horrible fucking stairs!

 

That was it!  She needed to sit down for a rest.

 

——

 

“Son, what the hell you doin’ sitting on my stairs?  You drunk?”

 

“No, Captain!  I’m just… I’ll be on my way.”  Quinlan got to her feet with a groan and felt something pop.  Then there was liquid running down her legs.

 

“Did you just piss yurself?”  Yondu demanded.

 

Tullk stepped forward and scooped her up.  “That isn’t piss.  Get the Doc!  I’ll get Quinlan to the med bay.”

 

Tullk left. Yondu bent down and put a finger into the liquid and gave it a cautious sniff.  No.  It weren't piss. He didn’t know what it was but the smell of it made his belly cramp.  Amelia was already in the Medbay.  He followed Tullk.

 

Amelia was working on someone’s feet when they got there. She took one look at Quinlan and kicked the patient out. 

 

She grabbed the scanner, the fancy one, and scanned the electro smith.

 

“OK.  Quinlan, you are going to be fine.  You are going to be just fine! I am going to take really good care of you.” She took a deep breath.  “The baby-“

 

“What?  Whoa!  What?” Yondu gabbled.

 

“- is six months early.  It only weighs four pounds.  I don't have obstetrical equipment and your waters broke.  I can't undo this.  I can’t save it.  And if I try, you will bleed out.  I am so sorry, but I need you to focus on me and concentrate on staying conscious now.”

 

Tullk was washing his hands.  “What can I do to help?”

 

“Tell Knix.  Keep him and the boys out of here.  They will be in the away and there is going to be a lot of blood.”  Amelia thought for an extra minute, “And get me Kraglin. I taught him how to use the blood bank machine.”

 

Tullk left.

 

Yondu panicked.  “I should go to.”

 

“Fine.  But send me someone.  I’m going to need someone to take care of the baby after it’s born.  It will only live a few minutes, but I don’t want it dying alone on the floor.”

 

Yondu stayed.  He didn't know who to send. Quinlan had kept the baby a secret for this long.  Now was not the time to be stirring up crew gossip.

 

Amelia did... something.  She kept her voice calm and low and talked to Quinlan the whole time.  She kept calm and the drugs kept the girl calm.

 

Eventually, she pulled a tiny little four pound baby girl from her mother’s body. She handed Yondu the baby and went back to trying to keep Quinlan from hemorrhaging.

 

Yondu looked down into the tiny little face that looked back at him and started to cry.  It was a tiny little mewling cry, but it was there.  Then it gasped.

 

“She’s crying! The little darling is crying! She’ll be all right!”

 

Kraglin ran over with the scanner.  “Yondu, she needs an isolet!  Her immune system can't handle the air.  Just try to keep her comfortable.  It won’t be long.”  He showed Yondu the readings.  Everything was underdeveloped.  It was all there, it’s just that none of it was ready to be out in the world yet.

“What’s her name?”

 

Amelia ignored him and kept working on Quinlan.

 

“She needs a name.  Can’t let her go without a name.” Yondu insisted.

 

“Fine!” Amelia said, not looking up.  “Call her Kaur.”

 

“What kinda name is that?”

 

Amelia turned to look at him with tears in her eyes.  “It means princess.”

 

Well.  OK.  He knew what to do about that.

 

——

 

There had been a problem when the placenta tore.  It was six hours before Amelia got the last of the broken placenta out, for the bleeding to stop and Amelia to decide the patient was at least stable. Quinlan had used most of the blood bank.  Amelia was exhausted.  She got Kraglin to tuck Quinlan into one of the patient beds and looked around. Yondu was laying in one of the recliners rubbing his belly.  Amelia curled up next to him and took a moment to have a little cry.

 

“You did good, girl!” Yondu said, rubbing her back.  "You saved Quinlan.”

 

“Yeah.” She said sadly. “I wish there was something I could have done for the baby.”  She stopped and looked around.  “What happened to the body?”

 

“Don’t you worry about that, I took care of Kaur.”

 

——

 

Yondu wanted to carry Amelia back to his room and cuddle her close and tell her how proud of her he was.  Under the circumstances, he let Kraglin do the carrying, but he still managed the rest.

 

The next morning, he went to check on Quinlan, but she had checked out of the med bay.  Yondu went down to the barracks to see her, but Tullk met him at the door and insisted that Quinlan and the boys weren't seeing any one just now.  

 

Then he frowned at Yondu.  “I gave them the month off.” He glared at Yondu, daring him to say something.  “All of them.  They are all affected by this.”

 

Yondu frowned right back at him. “Of course! Whatever they need.”

 

Tullk relaxed a little.  “You aren't a total bastard, Boss.”

 

“Yeah, well don't go telling anyone.  Have ‘em come see me anytime they can.”

 

——

 

Most of the crew went pleasure shopping on Akhaten.  He was hoping to see the boys and Quinlan while the ship was mostly deserted.  It didn't work out that way.

 

What did happen, was that Czar was able to get the location of Azul.  It was in the ass end of the quadrant.  The man was a guest of Thanos, in one of the mad Titan’s more remote outposts.  Yondu wouldn’t normally go for a target like that, but…

 

What he wasn't going to do was take Amelia with him.  He needed to keep his girls safe.  He needed to find an excuse to get Amelia and Quinlan off the ship.  But one that Amelia would come back from.  Which meant that Xandar was still off limits.

 

——

 

“I think Quinlan is avoiding me.” Yondu was laying in bed, spooning Amelia.  Kraglin was on her other side.

 

Amelia yawned and leaned back into his chest.  “Well, you did shoot Brahl in the shoulder last week.  Plus you aren’t keen on having women on the ship.  And you were there when-“ she broke off with a little half sob.

 

“Hey!  Don’t be like that!  It’s OK.  We’re doing fine here.  I got this.”  Yondu hugged her tight and rubbed her belly.  “I should apologize for shooting Brahl.  Fuck.  I don’t wanna do that.”

 

Amelia didn’t say anything to that.  “If I had told you why Quinlan needed to get to Xandar, would we have stopped there in time?”

 

Kraglin wiggled around to face her.  “You can’t do that.  You can’t second guess yourself.  You kept her secret because she asked you to, baby might come early on Xandar too.”

 

“On Xandar, they would have been prepared for that.”

 

“You did just fine, girl.  Quinlan is healthy.  That’s was your job and you did it just fine.” Yondu assured her.  “Don’t you worry about Kaur.  She’s in a good place.”

 

“Stop it!”  Amelia snapped.  “I can’t talk like that.”

 

Yondu stiffened.  “You’re hurt ‘cuz this dint go the way you planned, but that don’t mean it din’t work out ok.  You don’t need to be pissed at me.”

 

Amelia forced herself to relax.  “I’m not.  I’m just still upset.”

 

“I told you, don't worry.  I’m taking care of everything.”  Yondu hugged her a little tighter for a moment.  “You should try to get some sleep.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry! Just... Sorry!
> 
> Feel free to hate on the writer a little, just... you know... be gentle about it.


	5. Split the Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yondu starts getting ready. Amelia and the pack try to help Quinlan.

Yondu was in a room full of pissed off Carnies.  And Tullk.  He glared at the whole lot of them.  “I am not going to discuss this!”

 

They nodded slowly.  

 

Tullk asked, “Does the Doc know?”

 

“Hells, no!  I ain’t getting her hopes up!  I take care of my womenfolk!  I ain’t gonna promise anything I ain’t certain I can deliver.” He hesitated, “If you tell Quinlan, you damn well make sure she knows she can’t tell Amelia neither.”

 

They all considered this. Finally Knix said, “No… I don’t think Quin needs to know about this either.  Not yet.  Not until it’s for sure.”

 

“Right.” Yondu said.  “Now, when we go get this bastard, Azul, wut we gonna do with Amelia and Quinlan?  I ain’t bringing the girls along on this job.”

 

Everyone else exchanged looks and completely failed to mention that even if Yondu left Amelia and Quinlan behind, he would still be bringing close to fifty women along for this job.

 

Tullk tentatively offered.  "The Doc's been negotiating for months to buy a drug synthesizer.   It would make sense for her to take Quinlan since he’s been working in the med bay for a couple of months.  And if he’s going, of course he would take Knix-“

 

“And Jillam," Brahl insisted.

 

“-and Jillam,” Tullk continued smoothly.  “And Dave because he’s the best pilot.”

 

“And Peter,” Yondu said.

 

They all considered this.  “Yeah, ok.”  Brahl said.

 

“They all go meet the company reps and tour the factory.  We go get Azul.  We all meet up three days later.” Tullk suggested.

 

Yondu considered this.  “I’m sending Czar too.”

 

Tullk shook his head.  “It makes him uncomfortable being alone with her.  He's afraid you are will be upset if he’s her friend.”

 

Yondu frowned, but didn’t say anything.

 

It was Brahl who piped up, “He can get over it.  He would be the best tank we could send.”

 

Vexca had been watching all of this said quietly.  “She asked us to kill him.  When we have him, you will leave that job for us.”

 

Yondu sneered.  “I don’t take orders from the riffraff.”

 

Brahl cleared his throat.  “She asked us for this.  If we had not told you, you wouldn’t have know it needed to be done.  Whatever you do before he gets to us is up to you.  But we get to kill him.”

 

“She mine.  I should get to-“

 

Tullk interrupted.  “If she wanted you to kill him, she has had a whole year to ask you for that.  She did not.  She might not want you to know. She might not want you involved.”

 

“But-“

 

"No Boss.  If you don’t understand how this works, talk to Kraglin.”

 

——

 

The pack had listened politely while the Doc talked about postpartum care, watching for signs of depression.  When she got to watching for signs of hemorrhage, Snu had coughed.

 

“Um… Is it ridiculous that I’m telling you all of this when you could maybe just smell if anything goes wrong?”

 

“No.” Knix said gently.  “We can tell that you are worried about her.  But… yeah, we will be able to tell if anything goes wrong.”

 

Amelia sagged.  “Do you know what happened?”

 

Knix cocked his head to the side and gave her a questioning look.

 

“I can’t figure out what caused the premature delivery.  The baby… I couldn’t find anything-“

 

Brahl stepped and and cradled her close.  “Sometimes this just happens.  She was fine when she left the nest that morning.  I understand that this goes against your training, but you can’t save everyone.  We will take care of her.  She will get past this.  You made sure she lived to try again.”

 

“You are being really kind to me about this.  Why?”

 

Brahl shrugged.  “You take care of us.  We take care of you.  That’s how pack works.  You will keep taking care of Quinlan.  She will need you.  You have survived this loss before her and with her.  You will understand what she is going through.”

 

“How is she doing?

Knix answered that one.  “We are giving her lots of back rubs and not leaving her alone.  She is sleeping a lot, but she doesn’t smell like biochemical depression yet.   We will watch for signs of that.”

 

“Is she still eating alright?”

 

“Yes, but she hasn’t had a shit yet.”

 

Amelia nodded.  “I’ll stop by with a stool softener later, if you are ok with that.”

 

——

 

“I am so sorry, Quinlan.  I don't even know what to say.”

 

“No.  But you know what it's like.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“I gotta ask… was it because of… the moult?”

 

“Oh honey!  I don’t know what happened, but I know it wasn’t that.”

 

——

Quinlan lay face down on the floor, doing a reasonable impression of a sea star.  Knix was kneeling next to her, carefully rubbing her back.  Jillam was massaging her right shoulder and arm and Vexca was working on the left.  Marlyx had the right leg, with Snu working the other side.  

 

Brahl was off plotting with the Boss.  Quinlan was happy to have him around, but she smelled afraid when he touched her while she was naked.

 

The Pack was adjusting.

 

Females decided breeding rights.

 

——

 

Amelia was leaning back against Yondu. He was holding her legs open while Kraglin went down on her.  She had hit that clenching, writhing stage that Yondu always enjoyed, whether he was in her or not.

 

“Think you’ll ever wanna be knocked up again?”

 

Kraglin screeched to a halt and looked up at them.

 

“Wah?  Huh?  Fuck!  Yondu, you are asking me that, now?”

 

“Quinlan got me thinking to when Pete was a gaffer.  It weren’t so bad.”

 

Amelia folded her legs closed and crawled away from them.  “I can’t deliver my own baby Yondu.  There isn't anyone on board who could help.  There are no real statistics on Terran/Other species having viable pregnancies.  Which means the father would have to be Quill, and I just don't see him that way.”

 

“Kraglin could be the father.”

 

“Um, wut?”

 

“Has Kraglin ever done anything to indicate that he might want to be a father?”

 

“Uh - no!”

 

“He will If I tells him to!’

 

She didn’t know what to say to that.  So she got dressed and headed toward the door.  Yondu followed.  “I can’t think about this now.  I need to be severely less messed up before we have this conversation.”

 

Yondu nodded.  “Come back to bed.  I need to talk to you ‘bout som’ing.”

 

When she was settled, he rubbed her back and said.  “We got a job that you can’t come with for.”

 

“Ok.  I’ll just stay on the Eclector, like I always do.”

 

“We is taking the Eclector,” Kraglin said.

 

“Oh.”  Amelia’s mind raced. “What do you need me to do?”

 

“Take Quinlan and some of the boys and go buy a drug synthesizer.”

 

“You said you would steal me one.”

 

“You said that wouldn’t work ‘cuz we have to buy the refills from the company.”

 

Amelia sighed, “Yeah.”

 

“Yeah.  So, you go buy the damn thing.  I’ll go work to pay for it.”

 

“OK.”

 

Yondu hesitated.  “I ain’t pushing for nothing, but…. just think about maybe having a kid someday.  Little thing would have the best bunch of delinquent uncles in the quadrant.”

 

Amelia laughed.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm expecting the next chapters to alternate between the two groups.
> 
> Layers... get it?
> 
> Comments are always welcome.
> 
> Also: Woo hoo! I have a new subscriber! That makes three of you wanting to read this work and 15 of you who are generally subscribed to whatever nonsense I post. Very awesome! I know those numbers are sadly low compared to some of the writers on this site, but I am pretty proud that ANYONE is following me after only a few months of writing in a fairly niche fandom.


	6. Interlude

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kraglin/Amelia without Yondu. (First commenter called it a sex bomb. So now I'm warning you before you read it)
> 
> Sorry for the shaky start on this chapter. It should be all better now.
> 
> Although still not beta read... so... forgive the typos

Amelia and Kraglin were taking a moment.  Amelia liked to call it happy hour.  Kraglin was proud to go along with that.  He liked that the point of their time together was to make each other happy.  

 

Right now it was Amelia in a T-shirt shirt and panties sitting in his bed drinking a heavily watered shot of moonshine.

 

She looked around his room.  “I hope Winch gets that plumbing issue sorted out soon.  I’m missing having my own space.”

 

Kraglin snorted.  “That’s about the nicest I’ve ever had anyone tell me to clean my room.”

 

Amelia blushed.  “It’s your room.  You don’t need to do anything you don’t want to.  It’s just that …. well… you and Yondu…. well, I mean the whole crew really….  You just have a different tolerance of clutter than I do.”

 

Kraglin looked at her.

 

She shrugged.  “I just find looking at all of this stuff exhausting.”

 

Now he snorted, “I bet you love Tullk’s room then.  That boy has nothing in his space.”

 

“It’s one of the many reasons I like making supper there.”

 

Kraglin hesitated, then asked, “Would you sleep there if you could?”

 

Amelia set down her drink and made eye contact with Kraglin.  “I wouldn’t do that.  It would upset you and Yondu.  And I don’t want to do that.”

 

That wasn’t really what Kraglin was asking.  He took a moment to try to decide how hard he wanted to push for an honest answer.  Then he kissed her, instead.  

 

It was a slow, careful, and very thorough kiss.  She arched up into it and licked his lips when he stopped to breathe.

 

“I was right in the middle of something, when the Capt’n interrupted us.”

 

“Yeah, that was kind of rude, wasn’t it?” Amelia replied

 

“Well, I thought so.”  He kissed her neck. 

 

She gasped and arched up a little.

 

Kraglin allowed himself a self satisfied smirk.  “Mind if I finish what I started?”

 

Amelia closed her eyes and made a happy little noise. He took that as his cue to pull off her shirt.  She wiggled out of her panties a moment later as he licked her breasts.

 

Kraglin carefully pushed her onto her back and licked and kissed his way down her body.  Capt’n had spent a month talking about her skin before Kraglin ever ended up in bed with them.  He still hadn't done it justice.  Or maybe it was just the comparison to his and the Capt’n’s callouses.  All the crew did heavy work.  At any rate, he enjoyed the feel of her skin on his lips and tongue.  He liked the sounds she made when he rubbed his scruffy cheek against the softness of her belly.

 

“I never seen the Capt’n do this.”  Kraglin said.  “You let him when I’m not around?  Or is this mine?”

 

“All yours.  He tried leaning over me like this the first time he got my shirt off.  I panicked a little and he hasn’t tried again.”

 

Kraglin nibbled a nipple while he thought about that.  “Wut he get that I don’t?”

 

“Doggy style.” Amelia gasped.

 

Kraglin froze as his mind made a pretty picture.  “Can I watch that sometimes?”

 

“Kraglin!” Amelia whined.

 

“Oh!  Right!”  He kissed her again for a moment and he slid his hand down her body.  “You have no idea how much I like watching the two of you.   Captain all blue and scarred and you all silky and perfect.” He swirled his fingers between her legs.  “The contrast of his skin on yours.  Those little pleading noses you make that devolve in to you just sayin’ his name, begging him to make you cum.  You make the nicest sounds with his dick up your ass and your legs spread wide with my tongue in your cunt.”  With that last word, he pushed his fingers into her.

 

Amelia gasped and whimpered.

 

“Yeah, just like that.” He twisted his wrist and pressed up.  She moaned, her pussy clenched around his fingers for a moment.  “You like that, huh?  Maybe someday, he’ll let me go first.  Think about that, me balls deep in you.  Filling you up and his wedge shaped cock pushing it’s way in, stretching you out until all your whole world shrinks to the feeling of the two of us pushed inside of you.”  He locked his eyes on her face.  “When I start to pump, he’ll keep easing in deeper, so that every stroke I take will be more intense than the last.  How deep do you think he could go before you needed him to stop?  'Cuz he would.  However deep you could handle, Capt’n would stop and listen to you plead as I pound into you.”

 

That was it, the combination of his fingers slowly sliding out then stabbing in and the pictures he was painting in her head, she shuddered and bucked and grabbed his wrist to hold it still.

 

He grinned and waited for her to be able to focus her eyes again.

 

“Kraglin Obfonteri, I had no idea you were that good at talking dirty.”

 

“I had no idea you would enjoy it that much.”

 

"You are wearing too many clothes.” Amelia sat up and tried to open his flight jacket.  Kraglin laughed as she fumbled the latches.

 

“Need some help?”

 

“Well, now... that depends,” she smirked. “How much are you enjoying watching me trying to get you out of your clothes as compared to how much would you enjoy me stroking your skin?”

 

“I ain’t gonna deny that watching you trying to rip my clothes off cuz yur desperate to get at my cock is kinda nice.  But-“ he opened the latch at the top of his jacket and let her peel him out of it.  She ran her hands over his stained singlet before pulling that off over his head.  Then she was running her hands over his chest.

 

“Pete’s got more hair than I do.  He’s always shaving it off.  I would if you want me too.”

 

Amelia considered Kraglin’s chest hair.  It wasn’t like on Terrans.  It was about a centimetre long and strategically placed instead of the full pelt some guys had.  Kraglin’s short and curlies were too short to be curly.  “Nah.  This is nice.  Can you tell me about your tattoos?”

 

“They’re for doing something stupid.”

 

Amelia laughed and licked one of his nipples. Both of her boys only had the standard Terran two.  The crew ranged from none to eight.  The comparative anatomy was amazing.

 

“What stupid thing?” She asked, opening his fly.

 

“The two on my neck are the two times I was in the slam on Atraxi.  One was illegal transport of harvested organs.  Although, to be fair the Atraxi are vegetarians and it was a roast beast sandwich.  The other…  well, I don’t really like to talk about how I got in there.  But I was with the Captain when we busted out.  Yondu didn’t even make it through processing.”  His voice squeaked on the last word as her lips wrapped around his cock.

 

“Was that how you met?”

 

Kraglin fought for words, “This pay back for me stopping on you?”

 

“No.  But if you keep talking, then I don’t have to carry the other half of the conversation.”

 

“Yeah, it were how we met.  They dumped him, unconscious, in the containment room.  I happened to be pushing a broom in the hallway when he woke up.  They had left his ARROW in on the desk outSIDE the -Oh God!- cell and … Gah!  Stop!  Condom!”

 

Amelia laughed and reached into the bed side table for one out of the hundred pack of condoms.  

 

Once it was on, Kraglin grabbed her by the armpits and pulled her upwards.  “You be on top this time.”

 

“I can work with that.”

 

She climbed up and straddled him, then slowly lowered herself on to him.  They both groaned as he slid in between her other lips. Once she was fully seated, Amelia paused and took a couple of deep breaths before she started to rock.

 

“Ya always do that.  I ain’t hurting you none, am I?”

 

Amelia shook her head.  “It’s fine.  I just need to remind myself that is it fine.”

 

That gave Kraglin some pause.  “ ‘Melia?  You sure you wanna do this?”

 

At that, she locked eyes with him and started to grind.  

 

Kraglin blinked first.  “Now that ain’t fair.” he said, sliding fingers between them.  “We has a strict ladies first policy ‘round here.  And you is testing my commitment to that.”

 

“I did go first!  Were you not paying attention?”

 

“That was then, this-“ he found her clit, “-is now.”

 

Kraglin knew Amelia’s body by now.  He knew where to rub, how to touch, but it was still a close run thing.  He was barely holding on and as soon as he felt her flutter and clench, her rhythm stuttering, he flipped them over and finished off only a couple of strokes behind her.

 

They collapsed into a sweaty trembling heap.  Kraglin pushed damp hair out of the face and kissed her temple.

 

“God, I needed that!” Kraglin said.  He yawned.  “The idea of babies got Capt’n all fired up!  He ain’t been to see me since.…  Saving all his spunk for you.”

 

Amelia shook her head.  “Here I thought it had freaked him out, because I haven’t seen any action since then either.”

 

That punctuated Kraglin’s blissed out and sleepy brain.  “It’s been over a week!  What the fuck?”

 

Amelia shrugged.  “Do you want to talk to him, or should I?”

 

“Aw, hell!  I’ll talk to him in the morning.”

 

Amelia shivered and cuddled a little closer.  Kraglin pulled the blanket over them.  "Try to get some sleep, ‘Melia.  I’ll keep you safe”

 

 

 

 


	7. Wanted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amelia took a team shopping.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you read the last chapter shortly after it was published, go re-read. It was been hugely updated.

Amelia was on The Petrichor.  She felt like shit.  It wasn’t motion sickness, although she was prepared to let the crew believe that.  Dave was flying and there we no jolts or lurches to upset her.

 

No, she was feeling insecure.  Something was up with Yondu.  He was still paying attention to her.  They were bed sharing most nights.  They were on good terms about crew updates and he seemed happy to be spending time with her.  

 

But they hadn’t had sex since before the Quinlan’s loss.  That was weeks ago.  Well, to be completely honest, it was more like as far as she knew, HE hadn't had sex since before Quinlan lost her baby.  He was still all over using his hands and mouth on her, if she asked.   But even when she offered, he wasn’t interested in having a turn.

 

And now he was sending her away.

 

Amelia was a little worried that he had found someone else.  The last time he had finger fucked her until she blacked out, then declined to let her return the favour she had flat out asked that.

 

He had cuddled her close and calmly explained that it was the wrong time of year for him.  She would just have to wait a few months.  She had felt better after that.

 

Until a quick fact check on that with Kraglin had called bullshit.  Kraglin also said he wasn’t sleeping with Yondu either.  

 

Then there was this trip. Yondu had always been adamant that they couldn’t afford this piece of equipment.  Then, suddenly, he wanted to get rid of her and he had put down a deposit and arranged a factory tour.  When she pointed out the company was not happy with that, he had hired some fancy lawyer from Xandar to organize her trip.  Name sounded vaguely like the Portuguese word for arrogant.

 

He had taken away her room with some vague excuse about the plumbing.  That was unlikely, since her room didn’t have plumbing and the nearest water/waste stack was a good three meters past he back wall.  She knew this from memorizing the plans for the ship with Winch and Zyn.

 

He was also being secretive.  He was happy to talk about her day, but where he would usually offer vague information about his, now he was flat out ducking the question.

 

Then there was the route.  She understand enough about flight paths from Dave and Andries’s clandestine flying lessons to know that they could have made the trip in three jumps and one day.  Instead, they had loaded up on supplies and were making two jumps and taking five days.  So he wanted her gone for a longer period of time and this whole thing was him stalling.

 

Plus the crew was people she knew well enough to go with, but… maybe not well enough that they would refuse an order to take her to a slave market, if that was what he had gotten tired of her.  She was pretty sure Dave would want to keep her around, now that they were knitting buddies.  Quinlan seemed to be doing ok, but Amelia would understand if he wanted the ship to have a new medic that wasn't involved in what happened. 

 

The other thing that was making her uncomfortable was Czar. He had never been alone with her, and he still wasn't but he had never been in charge of her for more than a hour or two. But she was currently in his care for the next eleven days.  He seemed nice enough, but he was big and intimidating and not anywhere on her short list for who she would expect to take medical equipment shopping.

 

And the Eclector had gone dark, so she wouldn't even be able to message her boys.   This whole trip was giving her a bad feeling. 

 

The problem was, there was fuck all she could do about it.  Yondu assured her she was fine, they were fine, he would be fine.  It was all fine.  Kraglin admitted they were going someplace a little dangerous and they really didn’t want to get into a hostage situation.  Tullk had assured her it wasn't anything they couldn’t handle.  But no one had said what they were actually doing.

 

It was frustrating.

 

It was also the first time she felt the need to ask.  Maybe this was just Yondu trying to shield her from the nastier aspects of being a Ravager.

 

All she could do was try not to think about it.  Dave had brought her new yarn.  She should make Kraglin a scarf too.  There was a skein of [ Hawthorne in Klamath Falls ](http://www.knitpicks.com/yarns/Hawthorne_Tonal_Hand_Paint__D5420312.html?buy_individually=27404)with his name on it.    Hmm... he looked like a [herring bone](https://www.purlsoho.com/create/2012/03/16/lauras-loop-mens-mini-herringbone-scarf/) guy.  The stitch was interesting enough to slow her down and let a scarf take a few days, but not too fussy.  Open work was not a good idea for mechanics.

 

Plus she was kind of excited to teach Dave a new stitch pattern, and the wacky idea of needing 5mm needles with a fingering weight yarn.

 

——

 

Sleeping arrangements were a bit odd.  Dave’s M-class, which had been unnamed until Amelia explained what petrichor was,  had four bunk rooms, each with their own wetroom/chem shower.  Knix, Quinlan and Jillam took one.  Dave wasn’t sharing his. Czar took one.  That left one room and her and Peter. 

 

Amelia had suggested that based on gender, she should have her own.

 

Czar had firmly stated that based on a tendency to get stabby in the his sleep and the lack of med bay, he was not sharing on this trip.

 

Dave had countered with based on species, she should bunk with Peter.  

 

Amelia briefly wondered if that was Yondu’s plan all along.

 

Peter of course, took one look at the bunks and asked if she wanted to be on top or on the bottom.  When he leered, she announced she would be just fine sleeping on the couch.

 

Dave nodded.  “Well, now that’s all sorted out then.”

 

Amelia cooked supper with the promise that someone else would be doing the dishes.  Then after supper everyone sat around avoiding eye contact, waiting to see who would move first.

 

Amelia sighed, then got up and headed to the sink.  “Well, after that failed experiment, I will only be cooking for myself from this point on.  I don’t like staring at a messy kitchen until one of you breaks.”

 

Dave stood, up, put his hands on her shoulders and steered her back to the table.  Then he organized a rota and they negotiated for how long was acceptable to wait before washing them.

 

The crew was voting that as long as they were done before it was time to cook again, that was good enough.  Amelia was voting for as soon as everyone was done eating.

 

Amelia won.

 

Dave went first and washed dishes.

 

\----

 

"Amelia?  Look, I'm sorry I freaked you out. I wasn't trying to.  It's going to get cold out here during sleep hours.  You can have which ever bunk you want.  I promise I'll keep my hands to myself."

 

——

 

Four days later, Amelia was almost done Kraglin’s scarf. She still had another skein of yarn along, but she wasn’t doing a very good job of pacing her knitting.  Dave was plotting to cheat the jump plan and make a yarn run on Terra after they were done at the factory.  When Amelia had protested that they didn't actually have any Terran currency to buy yarn, the whole rest of the team had just looked at her like she was stupid.

 

“We are Ravagers.”  Peter said.  “We steal from everybody.”

 

Amelia shook her head.  “A lot of yarn stores work at a break even point.  If we raid one of them, we could be bankrupting a couple of families and shutting down a small business.”

 

“Knit Picks is a big business, would that be ok?  We could raid the warehouse in Vancouver Washington.”  Dave said easily.

 

Amelia just shook her head.  “I would have to be totally desperate with no place else to go before I would head back to earth.  But if I did, I would love to see the Webs Warehouse in Northampton, Massachusetts.  At least they have a store front set up.”

 

“Huh.” Dave said.  “But you like Hawthorne yarn.”

 

“Yeah, but Webs has everything else.”

 

——

 

Things started to go bad as soon as they landed.  They were greeted by the admin assistant Amelia had spend the last few months corresponding with.  That was fine.  Amelia had not expected Axtl to have barbie doll pink skin, but she was prepared not to be speciesist.

 

No, the problem was when Axtl had announced that they were touring another Ravager clan at the same time.  Everyone tensed.  Amelia knew Yondu’s clan had fallen out with the others over Peter.  Who was currently standing next to her.  

 

There wasn’t a discrete was to ask how bad this was.  So, she didn’t even try for discrete, she just went straight for English.  “ _How bad is this?_ ”

 

 _“We aren’t going to get shot, but I bet we also don't get the thing-a-ma-bobber._ ” Peter replied.

 

“ _OK_.”  Amelia said.  “ _Well, let’s all play nice and hope for the best._ ”

 

“Is there a problem?” Axtl asked.

 

“We had a falling out with the other Ravager clans more than twenty years ago.”  Amelia explained.  “Since then they have been spreading lies that we traffic in children.  I can assure you that my team will be very polite and on our best behaviour, but… I can’t make any promises about which ever other clan you are entertaining.”

 

“Interesting.” was all Axtl said.

 

He lead them into the next room and introduced Martinex, who glared at them and took their picture.

 

Even Axtl was shocked at how rude that was.  When he called Martinex on it, he shrugged and put away his tablet.  

 

They started the tour.

 

A few minutes in, the glittering man’s tablet pinged.  He pulled it out and looked at it.

 

He frowned and put it away.

 

"If we can continue,” Axtl began.

 

Martinex pulled out his blaster and shot Czar-doon.

 

Peter grabbed Amelia and ducked behind a shelf to return fire.  While that was happening, Martinex had shot Axtl, who had a slower reaction time, and Quinlan who still wasn’t moving fast.

 

“My blaster is only set to stun.  Hand over the girl and I won’t switch to kill.”

 

Peter looked at Amelia.  “ _That way!_ ”  he pointed into the factory.  “ _Run!_ ”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love the comments. 
> 
> I'm still not a knitter, so if you I got that part completely wrong, let me know how to fix it. 
> 
> Thanks!


	8. This Ain't A Rescue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Retrieving Azul, and other complications

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter assumes you have read "Run" and "The Moult". So, if you haven't read them, you may want to do so now. You will be missing out on a lot if you don't. It also references "The Patchwork History of Tullk Ul-zyn" Which you can just assume Amelia is familiar with.
> 
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/11251797/chapters/25152237

It had taken a lot of fast talking, but Tullk had managed to get Yondu to agree to let him plan the raid on Thanos’ compound.  Once he had a plan, it had taken several of the crew ganging up on Yondu to get him to accept Tullk’s plan.

 

It went like this:

 

The Eclector was parked at the boundary of Thanos’ space.  Tullk had taken an M-class with Brahl as the pilot and snuck up on the compound.  A scan showed Azul and a compliment of Chitauri guards.  Tullk snuck passed them and used Dave’s universal key to hacked the door controls of Azul’s cell.

 

The man was already in rough shape.  His right hand and foot had been crushed.  They were beyond repair.  From where Tullk stood, it looked like it would be less painful to just remove them, but they had been left attached for maximum discomfort.

 

Tullk gave an inner smile at that.

 

“Dr Azul?” he asked.

 

The man looked up, but didn’t say anything.

 

“I’ve come to get Dr. Azul.”

 

“That’s me.” he said weakly.

 

“What was the first name you were using?  Any prisoner would claim a name to get out of here.”

 

“David.  I was using the name David Azul.”

 

“Alright, Dr Azul.  Let’s get you out of here.”

 

Tullk had to basically carry the man out.  Brahl helped load him onto the ship.  They strapped him into the jump seat and snuck out.

 

As the ship was docking on the Eclector, Azul said, “Thank Gods!  I didn’t think I would be rescued!”

 

Brahl grinned showing his teeth.  “Aw!  You think this is a rescue!  That is so cute!”

 

——

 

Amelia woke up in what looked like the brig on the Eclector.  That was weird, because the last thing she remembered was the trying to find a place to hide in the factory.  Her back hurt, and her cheek.  She pushed herself awkwardly to her feet and went to open the door.

 

Her palm print didn’t work.  As medic, she had access to every room on the Eclector.

 

This wasn't the Eclector.  She peeked through the window and was unsurprised to realize she didn’t recognize the guards.

 

One of the spotted her and left.  The other repositioned to watch her through the glass.  She knocked on the door and gestured for it to be openned.  The big man shook his head, no.  He was green like Czar, but had the dental work of an Orc from World of Warcraft.  Definitely not one of her crew.

 

She was pretty sure she knew what to do. But she wasn’t ready to make her move while reinforcements where on their way.  On the other hand, if she waited for them to get here, she might not get a chance.

 

They arrived while she was trying to decided.

 

Martinex and some guy with glowing shoulder pads that would be the envy of any 1980’s pop divo walked in.

 

Amelia planted her feet and refused to move.  This meant that in order for them to get into the room, they had to push past her.  When the push happened, she did as Tullk and taught her in combat training and fell over as though her balance was worse than it was.

 

They looked shocked, but neither offered to help her up.

 

“Why did you kidnap me?” She asked from the floor.

 

“We didn’t.” Martinex said.  “We rescued you.”

 

“Bullshit.” Amelia replied as she got to her feet.

 

“I’m Stakar Ogord.  I lead this Ravager clan.  The clan who had you have been disavowed for-“

 

“Trafficking in children.” Amelia chorused.  “Yeah, I bet that works a lot better on people who haven’t met the child in question and are mostly OK with the upbringing he received.  Plus you are currently involved in the trafficking of sentient species, so who are you to judge.”

 

“What?”

 

“Well, I’m sentient and you didn’t rescue me, you shot my family and stole me.  And Peter is a reasonably good guy so you have no place being all judge-y that Captain Udonta raised him after his mom died.”

 

They both stared at her.

 

“Let me guess, ‘rescued' means ‘let’s see what a trained half medic will fetch at the slave market.’”

 

“We are taking you to Xandar.” Ogord said.  “You will be free and -“

 

“And unemployed and with out the legal protection from prosecution that slaves have when I get back to my crew.”

 

The staring thing continued.

 

“Well, now that we have established that you are a bunch of sadistic assholes, are you going to get out?  Or can I expect the gang rape from you and Mr Shine, now that the drugs have warn off?” Amelia patted her coat.  Her badges had been removed.  "Oh, that’s a nice touch!  Take my insignia so that your crew doesn’t feel so bad about abusing a Ravager.  Tullk Ul-zyn would be so disappointed!  Time was, the Ravager code meant something.”

 

Ogord slapped her at that. Amelia once again allowed herself to fall to the ground.  It had been quite a hard slap, so the fall was easy. “Don’t you lecture me about the code-“

 

“Why NOT?!” Amelia demanded from the floor, her eyes watering from the slap and the stress.  “From down here, I can see more abuses of it on your ship that I ever saw with Captain Udonta.  If he was so bad, why did Ravager founder, Tullk Ul-zyn leave with him?” Amelia gauged the level of pissed off-ed-ness and added, “And are you so pathetic that you will kick a unarmed female you have shot, stolen, slapped and already thrown to the floor, twice?”

 

They left.

 

That was easier than she had expected.

 

——

 

Azul was strapped to a chair in the dining hall.  The crew had gathered for discussion about what to do with him.  So far the leading suggestion was that since he had left the doc to be gang raped, maybe he should experience what that was like.

 

That was when Dave had broken radio silence to message Tullk that Amelia had been taken by Martinex.  

 

That rushed things along a bit.  Krss had brought out a cleaver and removed the damaged hand and foot, a nearly red hot pan had cauterized the wounds with much screaming.  Azul had been dragged to the brig and the Eclector had rushed off to try to intercept the Ogord warship.

 

——

 

Dave and Winch had explained that adding a new crew member to the security system was fairly easy, but changing the master passcode was fucking near impossible… so almost everyone (including Yondu) just left that as the factory default.  It was 64 characters long, and a pain in the ass to memorize and people just generally had it in a manual somewhere to look up as needed.

 

Then they made her memorize it.  She had written a poem where the first letter of each word was the next character in the key.  It was a little bit of nonsense, but it had helped.  The thing was, any security pad would accept it.  As long as these Ravagers weren't more security conscious than Yondu.

 

They weren’t.

 

She locked out everyone but herself.  Then she opened then access hatch to the Jefferies tubes that ran behind the brig.

 

Three decks down to the hydroponic gardens. It was just like playing with the boys.

 

It was an easy run the length of the ship.

 

The Achernonians let her get to within twenty feet of the exit before they stepped in front of her.

 

Amelia froze.  After working a whole moult it was easy to tell who the leader was.  Interestingly enough, in this case, it wasn’t the biggest one.  She made polite eye contact with his left ear, then tilled her head to expose her neck and acknowledge him as alpha.  They made sounds of surprise at that.

 

The leader crept forward, his nose twitching.  “What are you?”

 

“A medic, friend of Brahl and Knix and Jillam and Vexca and Marlyx and Snu.”

 

“I have met Brahl.  I can smell that you have eaten him.” he growled.

 

“I tended their moult.  I am part of their pack." Amelia’s mind raced.  The moult was more than a month ago.  How could he still smell that she had eaten the skin shed from Brahl’s shoulder?  Well, hell, the half life of [Bedaquiline](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedaquiline) for TB was five and a half months.  Maybe this was like that.

 

They laughed.  “We don’t accept softies as pack.”

 

Amelia shrugged. “That explains the scarring you wear.  I take care of my pack.  We only had 14 stitches among all six members last moult.”  They hissed in disbelief. “Don’t do that!” she snapped. “Use your noses!  I know you can smell a lie!  Fourteen stitches on Snu because he went first and shredded his back in his sleep.  No new scarring on anyone else.  My pack!  I protect my pack!” She glared firmly at his chin.  “Tell me I’m lying!” she demanded.

 

They were close enough to bite now.  All eight of them, noses twitching.

 

“We guard the food supply here-“

 

“I am not interested in the food supply!  I just want to leave!’

 

They laughed, “Of course you want to leave!  We have found you!  We get to eat any unauthorized people here!”

 

Amelia thought fast.  "I am authorized to be here!” It wasn’t a lie.  If it had been, they would know.  She was absolutely authorized in the security system to be here.  After all she has just done that.

 

They looked uncertain.  She pointed at the security pad.  "Let me show you.”

 

They followed her closely.  Her palm opened the door.  They were surprised, but let her leave.  When the door closed, Amelia leaned against it and breathed a sigh of relief.  And looked up into the face of an very surprised guard.

 

Sneeper!  Dislocate the knee cap, take his blaster, stun shot to the chest!  

 

Holy Frigg!  I can’t believe that worked!  Thank you, Tullk for all those unauthorized combat lessons!

 

Move fast, check the corners before rounding them.  There should be very few people who could get at her, since no one would be able to open a door or use the com system until they found the manual.

 

She took off her boots, tied the laces together, stuffed her socks inside and hung them over her shoulder.

 

The flight deck was more risky.  It was populated, but just like back home, no one looked up as she ran on silent feet over the tops of the parked ships.

 

She stole a blue one.  She liked blue.  Plus the name “Freedom’s Lady” had a certain appeal.  She found the security system that had been set to kill, and by passed it (Thank you Zvi!). She scanned for jump points and programmed in two sets of co-ordinates.  Then she set the master system to delete the surveillance footage for the length of her stay and to restore everyone’s authorization after deleting the event log that included her hack.  She gave herself a fifteen minute head start.

 

Drop from the mounting bracket and fly fast.  Any fighters running drill in the area would be on after her as soon as she cleared the warship.  She tried not to think about every time she had been shot down by the flight simulator.  She had to at least try to get away. She didn't believe "We rescued you and are taking you to Xandar" for one minute. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments please? Pretty please?


	9. Captain Stakar Ogord’s Very Bad Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Basically what it says on the tin. Captain Ogord finds out who he stole and who he lost.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AO3 has politely pointed out that asking for prompts or character names in not covered by the user agreement. 
> 
> Fair enough. They removed one work and I voluntarily removed two more. But the side effect of that is I'm trying to figure out Tumblr.
> 
> So, I think you can find me there as Pixel-Runner. I would appreciate any prompts you have or and advice on how to make Tumblr go.

 

“Stakar, you bastard!  I have spend decades being ashamed that I lost your respect, but you have gone too far this time!  Give me back my mate or so help me, I will blow you out of the sky!” Udonta bellowed through the comm channel.

 

“Whoa!  Just wait!  We just got our comms back on line!  We need time before we can negotiate!” Ogord replied.

 

“Gods damn it, Ogord!  If you hurt her, there will be no where you can hide from me and my crew!”

 

The Eclector was facing down the warship.  Every M-class had been deployed.  Every fighter was active since before they had reached the jump point.  Their opponents only had a handful of ship launched the Udonta’s crew had target lock on every ship bay.  As soon as anyone even thought about launching additional support ships, they would be shot down before they even cleared the clamps.

 

Ogord had been caught with his pants down.

 

Tullk came on the line.  “If you hurt the Doc, there will be no where you can hide from ME!”

 

There was no response to that.

 

Everyone held their breath.

 

——

 

“What do you mean, we lost her?” Captain Ogord demanded.

 

“When the systems crashed!  Sir, she must have gotten out some how!” said panicking crew member the first.

 

“How exactly did some primitive get out of a cell when all the doors were locked?  Fuck that!  How did some tiny unarmed female get past the guard?  She’s the only Terran on the ship, scan for life signs!”

 

“We can't see anything, sir!” answered panicking crew member the second.

 

Martinex hesitantly asked, “Do you think she is really Yondu’s mate, sir?  She certainly had the attitude.”

 

“I don't know.  She never said.  He hasn’t formalized it.  Find her and we can ask.”

 

“Kidnapping his mate really is crossing the line.”  Martinex said sounding worried.  As an after thought, he added, “Sir.”

 

“Sir!” said the nav tech, “We have reports coming in from our delayed fighters.  Freedom’s Lady deployed during the electronics crash and fled through a jump point.  When they followed there was no sign of her on the other side!”

 

“That Bitch stole my SHIP!” Stakar roared.

 

——

 

The stand off had lasted more than three hours.  Yondu’s crew refusing to leave without Amelia and refusing to believe that Stakar couldn’t produce her.  Finally, they negotiated for as close to a neutral third party as they had, to board the Stakar’s warship and check out what had happened.

 

Tullk took Brahl with him.  

 

Brahl was significantly displeased that the last place she had been seen was in the brig.  They could still smell her on the bed and on the door controls.  If Brahl concentrated really hard, he thought he could smell her in the wall.

 

Ogord arranged for a maintenance team to open the wall.  While they were waiting he asked, “Is she really Udonta’s mate?”

 

“Yes.” Brahl snapped.

 

“To my dismay, yes, she is.” Tullk said.  “She has been good for him.  If we don’t get her back alive, he will break.  He isn’t going to slink off in shame this time, he will hunt down and kill everyone who was on this ship when you took her.”

 

“He won’t be the only one going hunting.  She is the Alpha for my pack.”

 

“Udonta lets a bunch of Carnies fuck his mate?” Martinex sneered.

 

Brahl started to growl.  Tullk looked at him like he was stupid.  “No.  And you should really apologize.  Spend two minutes researching Achernonians before you comment on their social hierarchy.  Alpha status isn’t about sex, it’s about being able to protect the pack.  And she is very, VERY good at that.”

 

“Since when do Achernonians have a female alpha?” Stakar asked.  “And, yes, I know how that works.  Never heard of it being a girl before.”

 

Brahl just shrugged.  “She is worthy.”

 

Once the wall panel was open, they found Amelia’s log coat stuffed in the jeffries tube.  Brahll pulled it out and held it to his face.  He closed his eyes and breathed deep.  “You hurt her.  I can smell where you made her bleed.”  

 

Both Tullk and Brahl turned murderous gazes on Stakar.

 

“Look.  I thought I was rescuing her.  Freeing a slave.  Udonta wasn’t even there!  I thought she was some tart he was sharing with the crew-“ Tullk caught Brahl’s arm as the carnie swung a punch.

 

“And how exactly does “rescuing” someone leave them bleeding?”

 

“She said I was worse than Udonta.”  Tullk didn't blink.  Captain Ogord sighed.  “Look, I aint proud of this, but she pissed me off and I slapped her."

 

“I see.  Where does this tube go?”

 

“No one could fit in that.”

 

“You or I couldn’t fit in that, but the Doc?  She’s bendy.”

 

“Why you call her the Doc?” Martinex asked.

 

“Because she's our medic, asshole.” Brahl replied. “That’s why she was at that factory.”

 

“The woman I-" Martinex corrected himself, "WE stole was Yondu Udonta’s mate AND the head of a pack of carnies AND medic to a ship of Ravagers?”

 

“Yes.”  Tullk said calmly.  “THAT is precisely how fucked you are.  And you will never speak of her in the past tense again.  When we find her, compensation will be negotiated based on her current state.”

 

Ogord cleared his throat.  “Like I keep telling you, she stole Freedom’s Lady and left.”

 

“No.  She didn’t.”  Tullk said firmly.  “She is not a pilot.  She can’t even ride in an M-class without getting motion sick.  She did not steal your ship.  Unless you killed her and disposed of the body she is still here somewhere.  And you never answered my question… Where does this go?”

 

"To the gardens.”  Stakar closed his eyes.  “That’s why we can’t find her.  I am so sorry Tullk.  The gardens are guarded by pack of carnies.”

 

Tullk frowned.  “Let’s go see, shall we?”

 

——

 

Unlike Brahl's pack, these boys were nearly feral.  Ogord didn’t provide uniforms.  They were heavily scarred.  They watched the visitors like a starving man watches a sandwich.

 

“We are looking of a girl that may have come this way.”

 

"She was here.” hiss the alpha.

 

Brahl started to growl.  The others joined in.  There was an extended period of growling and snarling while everyone ignored Ogord and Martinex’s attempts to get the locals to stop.  

 

After a moment, Brahl threw back his head and howled.  The local pack joined in.

 

“Aw, crap." said Martinex.

 

“We are leaving.” Brahl announced.

 

“We didn't find her.”  Tullk said.  “I’m not leaving.”

 

“She stole a ship and we have been wasting time looking here.  We are leaving NOW!”

 

Tullk looked hard at Brahl, then shrugged.  Brahl headed to a different door than the one they had come through.  It opened to reveal a Sneeper that been bound and gagged with his own shirt.

 

“What the hel!” Ogord declared.  Martinex bent to untie the man. Brahl strode confidently down the hall.  The other carnies followed.

 

“What are you doing?” Captain Ogord demanded.  “Return to your posts!”

 

“You have broken the Ravagers code.  We will follow you no longer.  We have a new alpha now.”

 

“Him?” Ogord demanded, pointing at Brahl.

 

The pack howled with laughter. “No!  The woman who bested you.  The Alpha who takes care of her pack!”

 

Stakar thought fast, by the time they made the flight deck he grabbed Tullk’s arm.  In an attempt to save the lives of his crew, he said, “I want to apologize to Captain Udonta.  I over stepped. I thought I was helping her.  I never intended to break the code, I was just trying to make trouble.  This is on me, not on any one else on this ship.  Not on Martinex.  He would not have taken her, except that I ordered him to.”

 

Tullk considered this. “You will help us find her.  You will stop slandering Yondu, he was not intending to break the code either.  He thought he was bringing children to their father.  His intentions were pure.  Yours were not.  You will also work to have Yondu brought back into the fold with the other clans.  When we find her, she will be allowed to keep the Freedom’s Lady and you will pay for any medical care she needs.  You will also pay to have the bathroom in the medic’s quarters refitted.”

 

“And you both will owe her a big favour.”  Brahl added.

 

Ogord gritted his teeth.  “Fine, I want-“

 

“No.  You don’t get to ask for anything until we find her.”

 

——

 

“Where is she?”  Yondu demanded.

 

“She stole a ship and got away.”  Tullk said.

 

“ ‘Melia don't know how to fly a ship, let alone steal one."  Kraglin said.

 

“Um” Winch rumbled.  “She has logged a couple of hundred hours on the flight simulator.”

 

“Ignoring for a moment that I din’t agree to that, it aint the same as flying.”  Yondu said. 

 

“Maybe it is, if you are desperate.”  Andrei said.

 

Yondu sighed.  “I am going to kill him.  How much fuel does she have?”

 

“Full tank boss.  That isn't the problem.  The ship she stole wasn’t stocked.  She doesn’t have any food.”  Tullk said.  “And she can’t stop for supplies because she is technically a runaway slave.”

 

There was some collective swearing from the crew.

 

“Does she at least know how to navigate?  Or did you idjits set her up to get lost?”

 

“She can navigate great, Boss.”  Zvi said.  

 

“Where the hell would she have gone?”

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *politely requests all the comments*
> 
> (It was a stressful day and this weird little hobby of mine took up a lot of extra time today.)


	10. Light Fingering

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trying to find one specific person in a galaxy full of them

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm playing fast and loose with the time line. Amelia's story is in order. So is the crews, but the snippets don't really line up. Just go with it.
> 
> Also, if you open a second window with google maps in it, you should be able to follow along.

"We are looking for your wife, Dr Azul.  Where would she go?”

 

“I don’t know.  I haven’t seen the bitch in more than a year.  Sold her as pet food.”  He snorted, “Check the organic waste recycling tanks of ships visiting Terra last year.”

 

“If she were still alive and able to go anywhere, where would she go?  Where on Terra would she go?”

 

Azul laughed.  “Not to Terra.  I told her that if she ever went back, I'd rape her sisters.”  

 

Azul stopped laughing when Kraglin broke his jaw.  That ended the questioning.

 

——

 

Yondu stood on the bridge with the crew that had the most interactions with her.  There were more than he expected and the away team was participating via FTL conference.

 

“Ogord’s fighters tracked her after she left his war ship, but they’re saying she went through a jump point and when they followed less than a minute later, there was no sign of her.”

 

“Woo-Hoo!”  Dave shrieked.  “That’s my girl!  Fuck!  She did it!  Holy shit!  Yondu, our girl is now the second best pilot on the ship!”

 

“What in tarnation are you talking about?”

 

——

 

Amelia dropped the ship from the clamps ad bolted for the portal.  It took a couple of minutes for the support fighters to notice what she was doing and this ship was faster than theirs, so she was gaining ground as she ran.

 

Full speed through the jump point then do that maneuver that looked like a swimmer at the end of the lane.  Flip the ship, slam over to the other co-ordinates she had ready to go and hit the same portal in the other direction with a different destination programmed.

 

It worked.  Dave had promised it would.  But, there was a reason why they don’t teach this, he said.  It was strictly incase of emergency, he said.

 

Fuck.

 

If this wasn’t an emergency, she didn't know what was.

 

As soon as she cleared the jump point the second time, she collapsed out of the pilot’s chair and vomited on the floor.  She staggered to her feet, took two steps and collapsed again, unconscious.

 

——

 

When Amelia woke, the ship’s clock said she had lost twelve hours.  It was hard to keep track of time in space, but she was pretty sure that meant she had lost about a day and a half since they arrived at the factory.

 

A quick search of the ship turned up potable water, but no food.  A longer search found three ration bars.  Terra’s needed five a day for long term survival.

 

Amelia cleaned up the vomit and had a wash before she ate one.

 

——

 

“Can’t we just call her?”  Zvi asked.  “We know what ship she’s on, right?”

 

“Ogord has programmed the ship to block my calls.” Yondu gritted out.  “They tried calling her, but she ain’t stupid.  She ain’t gonna answer them.”

 

“So…. “ Quinlan said carefully.  “She is completely desperate, with no where to go?”

 

“Yeah.”  said Kraglin, grimly.

 

“I have an idea.” Quinlan hesitantly offered.  

 

——

 

This was possibly the single dumbest plan he had ever participated in.  Why the fuck was he even trying this?

 

Because he had no other ideas.  The away team all agreed that this was worth a try.

 

Fuck.

 

Fuck!

 

Gods damn it!

 

Yondu diligently landed his cloaked  M-class at 42.305480, -72.629637 on Terra.  He wanted to go looking himself, but the crew had out voted him.  That meant he was stuck on the ship while Kraglin and Tullk went to check. In case they needed a get away driver. 

 

How did this even go to a vote?

 

Peter had assured him that Tullk and Kraglin could pass as locals, but that he, Yondu, could NOT.  As long as Tullk let Kraglin do the talking, they would be fine.

 

Dave had even given Kraglin a script.

 

This was never going to work.

 

Yondu felt his belly lurch.  He gave it an absentminded rub and tried to calm his tits.

 

He couldn't be panicking when he had to take care of his little lady.  The thing that scaried him was, if this didn’t work… they didn't have any other ideas.

 

 

 

\----

 

They landed in a field where Kraglin and Tullk had about a 200 meter hike to the path and then a further click walk NNE to the target. It wasn't exactly woods. Sort of woodsy, mostly brush.

 

They were not confident of their destination, but Dave had said it would be clearly marked.  Of course, he also said he was some envious that they were going instead of him. He was rushing as fast as he could to get there but the away team were still hours out.

 

In the mean time, they had cleared the cover and were walking down the side walk in broad daylight. Regardless of Peter and Dave assuring they could blend in, Tullk and Kraglin were getting some weird looks from the locals.

 

They had made it to a fork in the road and looked at each other nervously.  Kraglin pulled out the directions from Dave.  It just said "go straight."  But there wasn't a straight.  There was slightly left or slight right.

 

They stopped and stared at each other in nervous confusion. 

 

"Is there someone you can ask?" Tullk murmurred.

 

Kraglin looked around at all the combustion engine based transport.  The pedestrian space wasn't that great.  It was completely absent on one side of the road and in severe disrepair on the other.  There was a fueling station that also sold crustaceans.  Kraglin decided to try there.

 

The door opened and the borded looking woman at the till looked at them.  _"Ha!  You must be the Ravagers!  Great name, by the way.  I'm gonna tell all the ladies at my church about you!  Nah, don't be looking all nervous like that!  Men folk shouldn't be ashamed of making things!"_

 

" _Um_.." Kraglin said intelligently, " _We is lost._ "

 

_"Oh, Sugar!  You is almost there! The easiest way is you wanna take the left road.  Stay on the sidewalk, people drive like idiots around here.  Just keep on down the road.  The just past the cosmic cab company cut through the parking lot.  That's the back side of the building, go around to the front and you are there."_

_"Um"_  Kraglin repeated,  _"How'd you recognize us?"_

_"The out fits."_

Kraglin did not understand, but he wasn't going to admit that.  _"Alright."_

 

\----

 

Amelia didn't know what to do.  She knew where she was.  With the absolute pin point accuracy that came from Nav training with Dave.  She had enough fuel to get almost everywhere.  But she was kind of fond of eating on a daily basis and she didn't have enough food for even a day, let alone days.

 

She wasn't really sure about stopping somewhere for supplies.  The only place, as far as she knew, where she wouldn't have to risk slave thieves was Xandar.  And they were slave thieves in a different way.  They would certainly see to it that she never saw her boys again.

 

There was no way in hell she was going to Knowhere.  She didn't entirely trust Mirena.  Kallu was officially unsafe and as much fun as Krylor had been, that didn't help her find her crew.

 

Tullk was a master hunter... may he could...

 

What?  Track her by scent through the vacuum of space?  She couldn't get the comm system to work and she was afraid to try too hard in case Ogord could track her by it.

 

OK.  Time to use your brain.  Dave said he spent time in Pacific North west.  Maybe she could... What?  Find a Sasquatch in two states, a province and a territory worth of area.  Yeah, if he could hide from cryptozoologists all this time, that wasn't going to work.

 

Besides she wasn't going to find him.  What she needed was someplace she could hide where he could find her.  Hopefully before Yondu found out about this. 

 

Some place where she would be safe from slave thieves, and could get food and where Dave would think to look. 

 

Fuck. That narrowed the list down to a choice of two.  And she had already picked one.  She had to just pray Dave had been paying attention. 

 

\----

 

Dave was illiterate.  That meant the script he had given Kraglin had been written down phonetically by Kraglin.  He was pretty sure it was going to get him slapped.

 

He concentrated and tried to remember if he had done anything that would set Dave looking for payback.

 

Oh shit! The sales person was talking to him.  This wasn't the sort of place he would usually think it inappropriate to say something like this.  But Dave had insisted this was the way to get Amelia back.  He cleared his throat nervously and blushed a little.   _"I'd like some of your light fingering."_ He decided to ad-lib a  _"Please."_  because... well.  This was embarrassing enough.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, I want your comments, but in this case I specifically want a yes/no if you were able to follow the clues to where Amelia may be. Please don't spoil it for those who are waiting for the surprise.
> 
> Other comments/feedback/writer love is always welcome


	11. Found

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amelia's boys go looking for her.

The woman at the desk gave them a long look over.  Finally she said, _"Does your tattoo say beef stew?"_

 

Kraglin blushed even harder.  Then his brain kicked in.  The woman at the fuel station had recognized them as Ravagers.   There was no way this woman could read his tattoo.  "Amelia is here!"

 

Tullk looked around anxiously, before closing his eyes and breathing in deep.  "She was, but I can hardly smell her anymore."

 

Kraglin realized the staff was all looking at them.  He had slipped up and gone back to speaking Common.  This was a test. _"No, Ma'am.  It means beef sandwich."_

 

Everyone relaxed.   _"Amelia said she called her foster brothers to come get her.  Said it might take a couple of days because you weren't in the neighbourhood.  She's over at the local women's shelter."_

_"What?"_ Kraglin demanded.

 

" _She didn't tell you, Kraig?  The guy she was staying with bashed her face in.  She turned up here, half starved two days ago.  She won't let us take her to the hospital, says she doesn't have coverage.  She won't file a police report against the bastard, said she scared he'll find her.  Maybe you can talk some sense into her."_

 

Kraglin's blood ran cold.   _"He bashed her face in?"_ he asked, his voice going deadly quiet.

 

 _"Well, she has a split lip and a hand shaped bruise on her face."  the woman clarified.  "She says nothing is broken, but she is really skittish about the whole thing."_ She gave the boys a hard look. “ _I'll make some calls and let her know you're here.  In the meantime, can I show you some sock yarn?”_

 

_——_

 

Amelia was sitting politely through a church service.  It wasn't really her thing, but the congregation had taken her in, found her clothes and were keeping her fed until her "foster brothers" could come get her. She was incredibly grateful, but also wondered if she had been a homeless black man with a split lip and bruised up face, would he have gotten the same warm reception?

 

She wasn't sure how long it was safe to stay here.  If SHEILD was still looking for her, likely not that long.  She had been here for two days.  She promised herself if they didn't turn up tonight, she was going to park the ship somewhere she could live off grid and just try to put the whole thing behind her.

 

She wasn't convinced they were coming.

 

Losing Quinlan's baby had been her first real failure as the ship medic.  Yondu had lost all interest in her after that.  The guilt that she hadn't found a way to get Quin to a better health care centre was bad enough. But Yondu's sudden polite coldness was a whole extra level of shame she didn't know how to deal with.  She wasn't entirely sure he hadn't sold or traded her to Martinex in exchange for a better relationship with the other clans.  

 

Maybe that was why he hadn't sent Kraglin or Tullk with her.  

 

By and large, she was proud of the work she had done on the ship, but she was still haunted by Taserface's death. She had a new round of nightmares over having one of her patients lose a baby, when she knew how heart breaking that was. 

 

Silent tears ran down her face. The little old lady sitting next to her reached over and squeezed her hand. These were good people. 

 

\----

 

When service ended, Amelia kept her seat. The church was old and beautiful and she didn't have anywhere to go. Eventually Janice from the office came in and sat next to her.

 

" _There's a man with an Asian character tattooed on his neck that says it means beef sandwich at Webs. He's looking for you. I'm not sure if he's your brother but the guy he brought with him has a scarred up face.  Roz says they are kind of rough looking_."

 

Amelia nodded, _"Growing up in foster care will do that to you.  Thanks for all you help, Janice. I honestly don't know what I would have done if the church knitting group hadn't stepped up to help me."_

 

_"Aw! Sweetie! You are so welcome!  I would say anytime, but you leave that bastard in your wake so this doesn't happen again, understand?"_

 

Amelia nodded and left the church. 

 

It was a short walk to the Yarn Store.  Kraglin was pacing outside. As soon as he saw her he ran over, flung his arms around her and hugged her tight. "Oh thank gods! We found you!"

 

Then he noticed she wasn't hugging him back. 

 

"Did Yondu send me away so that Stakar's crew could get me?  Is this because I didn't tell him about Quinlan? Is this because I couldn't save both her and the baby?"

 

Kraglin was stunned. "What?"

 

"He keeps telling me it's just sex. But that stopped and he'd came up with some dumb ass excuse to get me off the ship. Then I just happen to be stolen by someone he might want to buy a favour from. And of course I don't have a phone. What would you give a slave a phone?  He didn't want me to learn to fly a ship. Or how to fight. Or how to find my way around the Eclector. Or any of the things I did to escape. 

 

"Before I go back with you, I need to know, is Yondu trying to get rid of me?"

 

"He can't," Tullk said firmly.  "The Boss can't trade or sell you to anyone without you becoming a Citzen of Xandar."

 

They both turned to stare at him. 

 

"He can't." Tullk insisted. "I know this won't make you happy Doc, but he really can't. I won ten percent ownership of you off him in a poker game months ago.  Before you were fucking.  He can't sell you without my approval and I won't let him sell you to anyone but me."

 

Amelia stared at Tullk. "Why would anyone play poker with you?"

 

Kraglin was shocked. " 'Melia!  That was rude!  We all likes playin' poker with Tullk!  He loses almost all the time."

 

Amelia frowned. "I'm not trying to be rude!  It just that-" she noticed Tullk slowly shaking his head, no. She stopped talking. 

 

“Alright,” said Tullk.  “Here’s what we are going to do.  You and _Kraig_ are going to buy all the yarn the ship can carry.  Message Dave, get his list too.  It’s all on Ogord’s units.  I’m going to call the Boss and have a little chat.  Because as much as I would like to see you go ape shit on that boy, this will go better if he has a chance to think of a reply.”

 

Amelia shook her head. “No!  I don’t want to be manipulated they way he does with clients.  Tell him I’m found and leave it at that, if you must.  We won’t be long, you can’t spend units on Terra.”

 

The boys looked at her.  Kraglin cleared his throat.  “Yeah, you can… it’s called _Apple Pay.”_

 

——

 

Kraglin tried explaining.  “Tullk and the new boys all say that Ogord wasn’t trying to hurt you.  He was just trying to make trouble for Yondu.  Didn’t know that you are…  That you and him…. Didn’t know how things are.”  he finished lamely.

 

Amelia shook her head. “I don’t know how things are.”

 

Roz looked at them.  “ _What language is that?_ ”

 

Amelia didn’t even blink, “ _Klingon_.”

 

“ _Oh_.”  Roz shrugged.

 

Amelia filled two shopping carts before they even made it out of the sock yarn section.

 

Kraglin went quiet for a moment.  “You need to talk to him.  Problem is, short of breaking out the duct tape, I don’t know how to get him to shut up and listen.”

 

Tullk nodded.  “Leave that to me.”

 

Tullk bought all the yarn.  Roz even arranged to have it all vacuum packed for easier transport.  And he ordered a hand hammered copper bath tub.  They would have to pick it up in California tomorrow.  That wouldn’t be hard.  Their current challenge was hiking enough yarn to stock two prolific knitters for a year the kilometre plus to the ship. He started hiking loads back before Amelia was even done shopping.  

 

The first time he turned up alone, Yondu almost jumped down his throat.

 

“Was she there?  Where is Kraglin?  God damn it, Tullk!  I can’t lose ‘em both!”

 

“She’s there.  She has some concerns about coming with us.”

 

“What!? Let me go talk to her!”

 

“Yeah.  You are going to have to talk to her.  But it would be helpful if you actually LISTENED to her first.”

 

Tulkk packed his first load of bags away and went back for more.

 

——

 

Amelia, Kraglin and Tullk had dinner at the Northampton Brewery before heading back to the ship.  Kraglin is trying to get her to talk about what happened with Ogord.  She is ducking - or flat out ignoring - the questions.

 

“You said new boys?  What did you mean?” She asked in response to Kraglin trying to diplomatically ask if she had other bruises they couldn't see.

 

“What?” was his clever retort.

 

Amelia took a swig of her beer.  “In the store.  You said Ogord and the new boys said he was just trying to make trouble for Yondu.  What new boys?”

 

Kraglin looked at Tullk, who just smirked like he was enjoying the joke as much as his pretzel bites.

 

“Um… you did something to Ogord’s carnies while you were on the ship?” Kraglin asked.

 

“No.” Kraglin gave her a disbelieving look.  “I didn’t!  I ran into them in the gardens and talked my way out of there.  That’s it!”

 

Pointed looks from both Kraglin and Tullk.

 

“Look, if I have tried to fight a pack of carnies, I’ld be in the waste system of Ogord’s ship right now, not talking to you two!”

 

Tullk considered this.  “Well, you did something to impress them.  The whole pack is currently on the Eclector.  They swore allegiance to you.  You specifically, not Yondu.  Boss is not happy about that.”  It was the wrong thing to say.  Her whole body sagged like a marionette who had one of it’s strings cut.

 

“Great.  Another reason for him to be mad at me.”

 

Kraglin put his arm around her and hugged her for a moment.  “He ain’t mad at you.  He’s going out of his mind that yur lost.  You gotta face him some time."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All this time I have been trying to write a knitter because it seemed like a weird but interesting hobby for a character to have. 
> 
> But, I just signed up for a knitting class on Wednesday nights! Wish me luck!


	12. Yondu's Half Truths

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amelia says good bye to her husband.

Amelia, Tullk and Kraglin walked back to the ship carrying the last of Amelia’s purchases.  There were some new shoes, and new underwear.  She had also bought several gift cards on Stakar’s dime and handed them out to the women who had helped her the last two days.  

 

“ ‘Melia?  Ogord ain’t poor.  He can afford to pay those womin more en a thousand units each for takin’ care uh ya.” Kraglin had said gently.

 

Amelia had laughed.  “They will already be uncomfortable with the thousand dollar gift cards.  That’s why we aren’t telling them what they are worth; it’s already a questionably large gift.”

 

They came out of the brush and looked at the field where Yondu was parked.  Amelia saw nothing.  Then the cargo bay doors opened.  Yondu stormed out.  Tullk took her bags and he and Kraglin headed onto the ship.

 

Tullk looked at Yondu standing just outside the ship staring at Amelia on the edge of the clearing.  He gave a brief shit eating grin, then closed the doors and launched the ship into orbit.

 

“What the fuck are you doing?” Kraglin demanded.  “Capt’n’s still down there!”

 

“Yeah.  With the Doc and Ogord’s ship. It is way past time for him to get his shit sorted out.”

 

“He’s blue!  He’s gonna get lynched!”

 

“Meh.  It’s dark out there.  Doc’ll take care of him.”

 

——

 

Amelia watched the hatch close, felt the shock wave of the ship leaving, watched Yondu scream at curse at the empty sky as the invisible ship left.  She just waited for him to turn back to her.

 

Finally, he turned to her and said.  “You stole Ogord’s ship!  Where is it, girl?”

 

Amelia sighed and sat on the ground.  “It crashed when I tried to land.”

 

“Fuck.”  Then he really looked at her.  There was a bruise on her face and a cut on her lip that wasn’t quite healed yet.  “How long you been waiting for us?”

 

“A couple of days.”

 

Yondu came and sat next to her.  When he put his arm around her, she flinched.  He moved his arm.  “You OK?”

 

“Not really.  Did you arrange for Martinex to collect me from the factory?”

 

“What?!  Who the fuck told you that?”

 

“No one.  But it makes sense.  You don’t want me any more.  I’m a commodity you can trade.  Maybe Ogord wants a medic.  If you two bury the hatchet, your crew could get better people and better jobs.”

 

“I tole you I ain’t never lettin’ you go back to the slavers.”

 

“Ogord isn’t the slavers.”

 

“Why you got this in yer head all a sudden?”

 

Amelia wiggled away from him, putting some physical distance between them before she answered.  “You keep telling me, you don’t love me.  It’s just sex.  Your obviously bored with me, because it isn’t even sex anymore.  So, if that’s all I was there for why keep me around?”

 

Yondu swallowed.  “I can't fuck you right now.  You love me, yur gonna just have to accept that for a while.”

 

“I do love you, Yondu!  But that doesn’t mean I can just stick around waiting for you to try to trade me away again!”

 

“I never did that!”

 

“No?  It was just pure coincidence that the first mate from the one ship you needed to settle a score with HAPPENED to be at the drug factory you sent me to with one senior crew member and a selection of vulnerable junior crew?”

 

“Yeah!”

 

She didn’t say anything to that, but she didn’t say it very loudly.

 

“You don’t trust me.” Yondu said quietly.

 

“I don’t understand you!” Amelia almost shouted.  “You’ve been distant and secretive lately and I don’t understand what’s going on.”

 

“It’s Ravager business.”

 

“Yeah, but when it’s running guns or sex toys or providing armed escorts for traders or hunting down bounties, you tell me.  That you are trying to hide it means it either involves me or is something I won’t approve of.”  Amelia froze as understanding dawned. Suddenly, she was standing up and backing away from him.  “Is this where I find out Ogord was right?  Did you dump me so that you could go traffic children?”

 

“No!”

 

She didn’t actually relax.

 

He looked at her and sighed.  “Fine!  I sent you some place where I thought you’d be safe so I could track down yur husband and torture him a bit before the boys ate him.”

 

“What!?”

 

“Well, yur a medic. Din’t think you’d be up for flaying a man, when it really came down to it.”

 

Amelia stared at him.  “Did you really peel off his skin?”

 

“Nah.  I think Kraglin broke his jaw.  There was plenty of volunteers to pay back the gang rape, but then we heard you got took and that was put on hold.  We just stuffed him in the brig.”  As he was talking she started trembling.

 

“My husband is on the Eclector?”

 

Yondu tensed.  “He ain’t yur husband.  He’s the scumbag that sold you.”

 

“Can I see him?”

 

Fear gripped Yondu’s heart.  “He were banged up before we got him.  He’s missing a few parts and that ain’t on us.  And I don’t care what he says, I ain’t letting you leave with him.  I ain’t letting him leave atall.”

 

Amelia squeezed her eyes shut and nodded.  Then without even opening her eyes she asked.  “What happens to me when you find someone you do love?”

 

Yondu rolled his eyes.  “Love is a fucking bullshit term.  People say it to control each other.  It don’t mean nothing.  Used to be that Stakar Ogord loved me.  He raised me like a son, but I make one mistake and he kicks me out and spends the next twenty five years trying to make my life hell.”  Yondu changes topics before she can comment. “What you do to get another pack of carnies, anyway?”

 

“I don’t know. What will happen to them?”

 

“Whaddaya mean?”

 

“Will you let them stay with us?”

 

“Hellya!  Two packs of Achernonians and we could start taking tracking jobs or interrogation jobs.  And the new pack are ugly mother fuckers too!  And I’m proud you took em off Ogord!”

 

“I really didn’t mean to.”

 

“Yeah, I guess if that’s what you were trying for, they would have been on the Freedom’s Lady with you.  How’d you know which were Ogord’s ship?”

 

“I didn’t. I just like blue.”  Then she blushed.  

 

Yondu laughed. He walked towards her and put his hands on her waist.  “I’m glad you like blue.”  He smelled her hair.  It smelled wrong.  Wrong soap.  He nuzzled her neck instead.

 

“Yondu?”

 

“Yes, hun?”

 

Amelia thought about how to say this in Common, then just gave up and switched to English.  “ _I don’t know how you understand love, but I always think of Heinlein’s explanation.  He said, ‘Love is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.’  I want you to be happy and I am willing to sacrifice some of my happiness to ensure yours.  But it scares me that you see me as …  I don’t even know.  Not that, I guess.”_

 

_“That’s what you think love is, hun?”_

 

Amelia just shrugged.  “ _It’s how I understand it.  I’m scared that you see me a toy.  Something to play with and guard from the other boys, but ultimately something that will get broken and discarded.  I don’t want to be the Velveteen Rabbit._ ”

 

_“I don’t understand what that means.”_

 

“No.”  She said sadly.  “I don’t suppose you do.  Come on.  Let’s go see what we can figure out with the ship.”

 

——

 

The Freedom’s Lady was only a little crashed.  Yondu got them back to the Eclector in no time.  When Amelia stepped off the smaller ship and onto the flight deck of the Eclector, she was faced with a wall of friendly faces.  Peter started to clap.  The others joined in.  

 

Yondu beamed proudly and annouced, “That’s my girl!”  

 

Amelia blushed.  

 

Once all the back slapping and congratulations had died down, Amelia found Brahl.  “I’ld like to see my husband, if I could.”

 

Brahl stared at her for a moment.  Then he nodded and headed, not to the brig, but to the kitchens.  “He hanged himself in the brig while we were looking for you.  I had him put in the fridge in case there were any bits you wanted first dibs on.  I made sure none of the new ones ate him before you got the chance.”

 

Amelia froze.  She stared at Brahl with wide eyes.

 

“I know.”  He said.  “It is most unsatisfying.  I would rather have killed him myself.”  Then he remembered his manners, “Unless you had wanted the death for yourself, of course.”

 

It took Amelia a few minutes to be able to speak.  Her silence went on long enough that even Brahl - from a species with very little in the way of small talk - started to feel uncomfortable.  Finally she said, “I would like to see him anyway.”

 

When they got to the walk in cooler, Amelia was shocked to see Azul hanging with the sides of beef, a meat hook through his chest.  It took her a moment to be able to ignore that.  There were ligature marks around his neck and petechia showing in the whites of his eye.  She leaned in close.  He smelled like death, but if she could ignore that, his hair still smelled like David.

 

She collapsed into a sobbing heap on the floor of the cooler.

 

Brahl didn’t know what to do.  Krss paged Yondu, then he had Brahl help him get her to the med bay.

 

The new pack were all waited for med inspection and were surprised to see the Medic Who Was Alpha being brought in a sobbing wreck.  

 

Yondu followed close behind and pulled her close.  She wrapped her arms around his neck and sobbed into his chest.  He glared at Brahl.  “What did you do?”  He demanded.

 

The new pack focused and Brahl and started to growl.

 

He ignored them.  “She wanted to see.”

 

“Ah fuck!  Sorry hun, I was gonna work up to that.”  He rubbed her back, half expecting her to pull away and bolt.

 

“Thank you.”  She sobbed.  “I am so relieved it is over.”

 

Everyone relaxed.

 

Krss asked, “How would you like me to prepare the body?”

 

Amelia was a little taken aback that it was the cook asking that. “Uh…”  She looked around and saw the way too skinny Achernonians sitting at the other end of the med bay.  “I have a new pack to feed.  Just make sure all my boys get a share, ok?”

 

Brahl cleared his throat.  “Any thing you want us to save for you?”

 

“No.”  Amelia thought of the boys feeding shed skin in order rank or social attachment.  “I will no longer carry his smell.  I have a pack to feed, two packs to feed.” She knew they were waiting for some sort of ceremonial instructions.  She thought of Prometheus, “Just…. make sure everyone gets a bite of his liver.”

 

Krss nodded solemnly and left.

 

“Right.” Amelia said in a business like manner, pushing herself off of Yondu and heading to the scanner drawer.  “Let’s see what we are dealing with, shall we?”

 

Yondu gave her a gentle shoulder squeeze but left before she had crossed the room.  The new boys were all malnourished, they were only maybe a month away from starting their own moult. They also had the parasitic skin infection that Brahl’s pack had so far avoided.  So she set them up in quarantine in the med bay and went to see Tullk about some sheep dip or whatever they would need.

 

Yondu went to find Peter and Andrei.  He needed to ask what a velveteen rabbit was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments please


	13. No Rest

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Weirdly broken chapter because the next one involves a lot of cannibalism. Read here, then skip the next one if you want. You won't really miss too much

Amelia was exhausted.  It had been the longest week of her life and that included her time at the slave market.  All she wanted was to go to her room, lock her door and curl up in her bed.  She was heading down the hallway there when Zvi spotted her.

 

“Whoa!  Easy there Doc!  Rooms’s not done yet.  We still have exposed wires and the back wall is all ripped out.  Not safe yet.”

 

Amelia scrubbed her face. She kind of wanted to cry at that.

 

Zvi noticed.  “You OK?”

 

“I will be.  I’m just so fucking tired.”

 

“Hey!  It’ll be ok. Look, it’s almost supper and I hear Krss and the crew have something special planned.”

 

Amelia gagged.  “Ugh.  I think my husband is on the menu.”

 

Zvi looked surprised. “No.  I can say with absolute certainty that isn't it.  Come one.  Let’s go see.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments please


	14. Naming Ceremony

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cannibalism. You don't have to read this. What you need to know will be summarized at the beginning of the next chapter. Feel free to skip. In fact, please skip and don't hold this against me.
> 
> But there is cake. And the crew are treating the new boys like people, which they aren't used to.

The dining hall was full. The new Achernonians already had their own table and were sitting down to bowls of raw meat strips that Amelia didn’t want to think to hard about.  

 

Brahl stepped up to whisper in her ear.  “You are doing great with those boys, Doc.  As much as I want you sitting with us and Quin, it would be good for them if you joined them.  It doesn’t sound like they were actually considered part of the crew when they were with Ogord.  Not everyone thinks we count as people.  Yondu is good at that because growing up, he wasn’t people either.”

 

Amelia looked over at the new boys.  One of them noticed her looking at them and they all stopped eating.  “Oh,” said Brahl, “and you are definitely going to have to do something about that.”

 

Amelia was a bit puzzled about that but went over and sat down.  None of them were eating, they were all avoiding eye contact.  “Everything, OK?” she asked.

 

There was a long pause, then the smallest one said, “Your second told us to eat.”

 

Amelia tried to translate that.  “You mean Kraglin?”

 

Pause.  “The Ullin.”

 

“Oh!  Tullk!  Yeah, he’s not… well, yeah I guess…  Um.  Yeah.  You should eat.” Everyone relaxed.  Amelia made a point of ignoring them.  The sounds they made while eating was a bit… upsetting.  “I see we found you some uniforms.  I promise we’ll get you some that fit a bit better once we get somewhere with a tailor.”

 

They all froze again.  The alpha said, “You will give us clothes?”

 

Amelia frowned.  “Well… um… sure?  I guess I thought you might want to buy something that fits.  From what I hear, Yondu actually pays quite fairly and -“ they had all stopped looking at her.  “What?”

 

There was a hurried quiet discussion in growls that Amelia couldn’t understand.  “Captain Yondu told Admiral Ogord that you were his mate.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“But he doesn’t carry your kit.”

 

“I’m sorry?  I don’t understand what you mean.”

 

Someone else said.  “All the females hide except you.”

 

Amelia sighed.  “Yeah.  Yondu has a don’t ask don’t tell policy about gender.  Everyone gets a male pronoun and as long as you get the job done, he doesn’t care what you have in your pants.  Just… don’t go calling any of the females on it, ok?”

 

They nodded.

 

“What are your names?”

 

“We don’t have names in common.  The crew can just call us Carnie.”  the speaker flinched.  “This upsets you.”

 

“Not your fault.  I just think that people need names.  But I’m not sure it would be rude for me to name you or not.”

 

They all stared at her.  The biggest one said, “We would be honoured to take the names you would give us.”

 

“Oh!  Um.. Ok…  let’s see,  Hmm.  Seven _dwarves_ , eight _tiny reindeer_ , but you don’t need Peter teasing you.  Eight wrist bones but that doesn’t really help if I give you a name then can’t remember which of you is which, umm-“

 

Dave, who had been sitting with his back to her, stood up and clapped her on the back.  “I got this Doc.”  He headed out to the kitchen.

 

They were all watching with wide eyes.  “You let them touch you?”

 

That derailed Amelia’s train of thought.  “Some of them are allowed social touching.  It is something you have to earn.”

 

Dave came back with a bowl of veg soup for her and a meat joint in a bowl that he handed to the guy sitting next to her. “Get one of the little bones out of that, then pass it to the next guy.”

 

“What are you doing, Dave?” Amelia asked.

 

Dave shrugged.  “They each get a wrist bone and I’ll put a loop on it so they can wear them as a necklace or an earring or something.  Everyone gets a name and you can easily tell which name goes with which person by reading the jewelry.  Easy.”

 

Amelia nodded slowly.  It wasn’t random.  Once they all had a bone, they traded.  She guessed that it was based on pack hierarchy or something.  But they were very clear that some of them deserved bigger bones like he scaphoid or the capitate and the smallest one got the pisiform.  Amelia decided firmly that she would not think about where the bones actually came from.  “Thanks Dave.”

 

Dave smiled widely. “Glad to help.”

 

Yondu stood up and made a speech about how happy they were to have her back and how he was pleased with how the mission went.  Then Krss brought out cake.  Lots of cake.

 

“Where’d you get cake?” Amelia asked as he handed her a slice.

 

“Costco.”

 

“Huh.”

 

“Are you going to want to hand out the liver?  Or do you just want me to do it?”

 

“I’m sorry?”

 

“Well, it’s just that the pieces aren’t very big.  It was a bit of a challenge to cut a liver into three hundred and forty seven pieces, but you said to make sure everyone gets a bite.”

 

“Umm.”

 

“It would be nice if you did it.  I mean, if you are up to that.  I can get them all to line up so you aren't just mobbed.  This really was a team effort.  It was really hard keeping it a secret from you.”

 

“O..kay.  Um…  yeah … sure.  Just…. let everyone know that if they don’t want to, it’s OK.  I’m not trying to force anyone to …  it’s OK if they don’t want to.”

 

Krss nodded.  Then he turned to Lunate.  “I’m sorry, I don't think you can eat this.  But I have saved some bone marrow for you boys.  I’ll bring it out in a moment.”

 

That caused a stir of excitement.

 

Amelia felt her stomach roll.

 

\----

 

The crew was very reverential as they came up and she presented them with a piece of liver.  They all said something about being glad to have her back or being impressed that she escaped Ogord or that they were please she stole a ship or something kind as they came by.

 

Then Peter was next.  

 

“ _I am so sorry!  I honestly don’t know how I got here_.” Amelia apologized.

 

“ _It’s OK.  I can’t tell you how many people have told me they had no idea Earthling were this bad ass. It’s kind of cool.”_

 

Amelia blushed.  

 

 _“Now.”_ Peter continued, with a twinkle in his eye, _“Give me some liver baby.”_

 

Amelia laughed.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry.
> 
> (Monty Python reference: Can we have your liver?)
> 
> https://youtu.be/aclS1pGHp8o


	15. Velveteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the last (optional) chapter, Amelia named the new boys after the bones in the human wrist. Dave made them pendants out of the bones from Azul's wrist. The whole crew ate Azul's liver after Krss misunderstood Amelia's comment about making sure everyone gets a bite.
> 
> The crew suddenly think Terrans are bad ass in a way that all Peter's talk about "Planet of Outlaws" never managed to convey.
> 
> The new pack are just amazed that Yondu's crew are treating them like people and not just guard dogs. Hints at them having food issues.
> 
> In this chapter: Yondu reads The Velveteen Rabbit. Which, when you're six, is a cute story about a bunny, but is somewhat more disturbing as an adult with an understanding pop psychology

Yondu was first in line to get some liver. He had no idea how she came up with that, but in terms of crew solidarity, it was pure gold. He popped his piece in his mouth with a saucy grin and a nod then left to go try to find out what the hell she was talking about while she was distracted.

It took a few tries to figure out how to spell “Velveteen” well enough for the search engine to figure out what he meant. It took a few more tries to find the actual story.

Fuck. That’s some messed up shit. Ain’t no magic fairy saving the fucking toy. The damn bunny ended up on the fucking bonfire and that sentimental crap was just added to make people feel soft.

Worst part was he could see her being the bunny. But he weren’t sure he was the boy. He sorta felt like it could also be that Tullk was the boy and he was the Nana. He weren’t sure he could be the soft that she needed. The person who made her feel real.

God damn it. She made him feel real. And worse, when she were gone, taken, fear had gripped his heart in a way he ain’t felt since Pete were big enough to hide from the crew.

He hadn’t really thought about love the way she said. Maybe that fear, maybe that were part of it. Of being afraid for the other person. Of trying to protect their happy. Protect their real.

The story didn't really say what happened to the boy when the bunny was burned. Just that he remembered the bunny later.

God damn it!

Yondu was starting to understand exactly how badly fucked up he was.

——

He found her, still in the dining hall, hours later. She was sitting with the new fellas, barely keeping her eyes open while Tullk talked to them. When he came up to the table, the new boys stood up and took defensive positions.

His knee jerk response was outrage. But it was quickly followed by an understanding of how that could be useful. They all had little bone pendants hanging from the thin string she made socks out of. Huh. That could be useful too. He would talk to Krss in the morning about how much usable ivory was left.

“Com’on hun. Time to sleep.”

Amelia nodded and pushed herself out of the chair. Then she turned to Tullk. “Please make sure they have a good place to sleep.”

“On it, Doc.” Tullk nodded. “Get some rest. We’ll take care of things while you two sleep yourselves out.”

They walked the ship in silence, but Yondu stopped her outside the door. “Kraglin’s in there. He’s gonna want to lick every inch of you. I wanna get you in the shower and scrub the smell of Terra off you. Maybe spend some extra time washing between those legs, making you shiver. But there is something you need to know first.” He paused and took a breathe. “I din’t know what you were talking. Din’t know no Velveteen Rabbit. So I found it and I read it.” He paused. Amelia just hung her head.

“I don’t know ‘bout what you think love is. But you make me feel real. An’ I wants you to be happy. An’ I ain’t gonna sell you or trade you or nothin’. I know you takes care of yours. Ain’t never really hand no one I thought of as mine. But it’s you.” He thought for a moment. “An’ Kraglin… an Pete….an maybe the crew,” he added, grudgingly. “An I will take care of you.” He cupped her cheek and then ran his hand around so he was holding the back of her neck. He thoughtfully rubbed her ear lobe with his thumb. “I tole Stakar that you was my mate. You is. I wanna be yours too.”

Amelia gaped up at him. “Yondu Udonta, did you just ask me to marry you?”

He froze.

She took a step back and looked at the floor, her face red. “Right! Sorry! No! I just… misunderstood again.”

He kissed her hard. “I wants you to wear my earrings. It’s som’ing a Centaurian does when they choose a mate. That good enough for ya?”

“Yeah. Yeah. That’s… I love you, too, Yondu.”

“I ain’t gonna be able to be soft for ya. There’s stuff yur gonna need Kraglin for. And, as much as I hate to say it, yur gonna need Tullk for some stuff too.” He hesitated. “I want to make you cum so hard, it ain’t just the carnies that can tell I smell like you, but it’s been a while and ifs you need some time to get use to me again-“

What ever he was going to say was halted by her lips on his and her hands going to the buckles on his pants. 

He fumbled for the door lock and she pushed him inside.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments please. The last three chapters were supposed to be one chapter, but were split to give people the option of skipping the eating people. 
> 
> Next chapter: smut.


	16. Gifts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Further discussions of long term plans, with barely any smut.

Kraglin was pacing.  If you could call it that in only about six feet of floor space.  Capt’n had said he wanted some time to talk to ‘Melia first.  That wasn’t a good sign.  Capt’n, well, talkin nice weren’t really his strong suit and he seemed to get it completely ass backwards Every. Fucking. Time. he tried to talk about anything important will their girl.

 

Fuck.

 

Kraglin needed to get laid.  It had been a couple of weeks since they packed Amelia onto the Petrichor and waved her off.  He’d spend that time shaking hands with hisself.  Captain still weren’t interested in him.  That was weird.  They’d been together for years and, it wasn’t always Kraglin, especially not in those early days, but ….  A dry spell for Yondu was measured in days, not weeks.  Even when the girl were new and scared and Kraglin was still using his own room, Capt’n would come looking for him through out the day.

 

The thing was, Kraglin needed a fuck and as much as having the boss say the wrong thing and freak ‘Melia out so that he could spend the night comforting her in his room was the fasted way to get one…  That wasn’t what he wanted.

 

He wanted to go back to being the filling in the sandwich with both of them fucking him at the same time.  He really wanted to try out Amelia as the filling.

 

It was a little upsetting that Yondu was shunning them both.

 

Still, Capt’n was getting older.  Maybe this was just how it was gonna be now.  

 

Kraglin sighed and sat on the bed.

 

The door burst open and they almost fell through it. Yondu catching Amelia’s weight and pulling her into the room.

 

“Go sit on the bed!” Yondu called.  “I gotta find ‘em!”

 

“Find what?”  Kraglin asked.

 

Yondu froze.  

 

Amelia’s happy smile didn't waver. “Wait!  I’ll be right back!” She said and fled.

 

Yondu clicked something under his breath.  Then he turned to Kraglin.  “Girl’s gonna wear my earrings.”  he said quietly.

 

Kraglin felt like he had been slapped.

 

“Yur givin’ her yur earrings?” He repeated.  “You tole me it don’t matter and you didn’t know where they was.”

 

Yondu sighed.  “She can’t take care of herself, Kraglin.  I need to mark her.  Ogord wouldn’t have taken her if she had them.  You can take care of yourself.  You don’t need-“

 

“Recognition?” Kraglin suggested.

 

Yondu sat down and put his hand on the man’s back.  “You know what she thinks love is?  She said it’s when you want someone to be happy.  Enough that you can’t be happy if they isn’t.  What do you think of that?”

 

Kraglin tried to focus on the question and not the hurt that was clawing at him.  “Sounds about right.”

 

“If you is hurt by me given’ em to her, I won’t.  I’ll find something else.”

 

Kraglin clapped his hand over Yondu’s forehead.  “You don’t have a fever.  Right! Who is ya and where’s the Captain?”

 

“I’m trying to be serious here.”

 

“So am I!  Where is this coming from?”

 

“I’m a little … hormonal just now.  I’m expecting you to keep this to yurself-“

 

“Found it!” announced as Amelia as she came back into the room.  She pushed a bundle into Kraglin’s hands.  It was wrapped in reused paper from the first time Yondu had gotten her something.  Kraglin burst out laughing.  He laughed until he slid off the bed and tears ran down his eyes.

 

Amelia grinned.  “Paper, surprisingly hard to find in space.  Who knew?”

 

Being very careful to not rip anything, Kraglin opened his present.

 

“It’s a scarf.  The pattern is a lot harder than the one I made for Yondu, but I wasn’t working in the dark, so…”  She looked up at him shyly.  Then she took it from him, wrapped it around his neck and used it to pull him close for a kiss.  “There!  Now both my boys have one!”

 

She said it so happily that Kraglin immediately regretted what he had been feeling only moments ago.  She could be Yondu’s and he could be hers.

 

He cleared his throat.  “Would you wear something of mine?”

 

“Sure!  As long as it doesn’t say roast beast sandwich.” she grinned as she said it.

 

Yondu put his hand on the back of Kraglin’s neck and pulled him in.  He kissed Kraglin’s temple.  “Whatcha gonna give her?”

 

Kraglin considered his scarf. “I’ll think of something.  In the mean time, you had some earrings to find.”

 

“Yes, I did. Do me a favour and make her cum while I’m looking, will ya?”

 

“Yes, sir!”  

 

Kraglin turned a predatory look on Amelia. 

 

She was still grinning right back at him.  “I missed you,” she said.  She hugged him tight.

 

Kragli pulled her close and breathed deep.  “You smell funny.”

 

Amelia blushed and gasped and pulled away.  She gave him a push.  “You smell like engine grease and I never say anything!”

 

“Lets go fix that, huh?”  Kraglin took her hand, “We’re going to use the showers on the 17th floor.  Be back in a while.”

 

Yondu was still elbow deep in his drawers.  “It’s still broke.  Use mine.  We’ll stop by and get a hotel so you can have a bath tomorrow.  Tullk’s got to pick something up.”

 

Amelia focused intently on Kraglin as he stripped.  He was a little hesitant to drop trou, which was unusual.  But Amelia immediately noticed why.

 

“My, my!  That certainly doesn't look like a ladies first situation!’ 

 

Kraglin blushed.  His cock was red, hard and leaking already. 

 

Amelia gently ran her hand over his body.  His sack was heavy and so full the skin was pulled tight.  “That is the worst case of blue balls I’ve seen in a long time, Kraglin.”

 

Yondu turned to look at them at that.

 

“Been kind of busy.”  His voice squeaked at the last word as Amelia drew a finger up the underside of his dick.

 

“It’s OK.  I’m going to help out with this, because that just looks painful, then we can have a shower, then it can be my turn.”

 

“Uh-“

 

“No, Kraglin, don’t look at him, look at me.  Please let me help with this.”

 

Kraglin closed his eyes and swallowed then nodded. Amelia dropped to her knees.

 

“Condom!” Kraglin gasped.  Amelia nodded.  She helped him step out of his pants and dug one out of his pocket.  She pushed him back on the bed.

 

“Just keep your hands to yourself and let me.”

 

He was already at the mewling, whining stage as she even just rolled the rubber down his shaft.  “It’s OK.  Just let go.” She licked him from root to tip, then swirled her tongue around the end before flattening out her tongue and bobbing her head down, taking as much as she could into her mouth. Then she wrapped her right hand around what was left.

 

Yondu came over with the bottle of lube. He lubed up her left hand.  “I think our boy could do with a finger or two.”

 

Amelia hummed her agreement.  Kraglin’s hips bucked.  Yondu caught the man’s right leg and pulled it up and out.  Amelia felt blindly for his hole as she kept bobbing her head, sliding her mouth over his cock.  She stroked his rim, then swallowed as she pushed a finger in, she turned her hand and cocked her finger and found his prostate.

 

Behind Kraglin’s eyelids, the world flashed white and his whole body spasmed and twitched.  

 

When he could focus his eyes again, he started to apologize.  “I’m sorry, that was embarrassing.”

 

Amelia just laughed.  “You really needed that!”

 

“Yeah, I did.”

 

“I’m going to have that shower now.  It’s isn’t big enough for the two of us.  So after you have a wash, then maybe you can return the favour?”

 

“Oh yeah.” Kraglin agreed sleepily. 

 

He was completely out like a light when Amelia got out of the shower. She smiled to herself and crawled into bed next to him.  “Come to Bed, Yondu. It's time to sleep.”

 

“You dint get a turn.”

 

“He needed it more than I do.  And I'm just tired.  I was going to just skip dinner and go sleep in my room.”

 

Yondu picked Kraglin's scarf out of the pile of clothes on the floor.  “This is nice.”

 

Amelia smiled. “Thank you.  It was interesting to make.”

 

He hesitated.  “The scarf thing… that mean something to you?  Was I asking for….  things when I asked for my scarf?”

 

Amelia shrugged.  “That thing you said, about wearing my fear and shouldering my nightmares, THAT meant something.  Kragln’s means that I spend thirty hours working on making him something nice.  Mostly Terrans trade rings.  But that is a good way to lose a finger around here.  Some cultures exchanged spoons or cups.”  She stopped because Yondu had started swirling his fingers over her breasts.

 

“How tired are you, Hun?”

 

“I’m pretty tired, Yondu.  And you aren’t even naked yet.”

 

“I don’t need to be naked to make you feel good.”

 

Amelia chuckled.  “When I was young and impressionable, I read somewhere that “ _An erection is all well and good, but a man who isn’t hard and still wants to make love to you, now THAT’S flattering.”_ But damned if I can remember who said it.”

 

Yondu tensed when she started the quote and relaxed a bit by the end.

 

“What would make me feel really good just now would be you talking off your clothes and helping me haul Kraglin up here and all of us just sleeping in a pile.  I missed you both.  I just want to snuggle up and feel safe again.”

 

“Yeah, I can do that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments please!


	17. Fitting In

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am not anything close to being a doctor, so please don't self diagnose based on fan fic. 
> 
> If you recall way back in Buying Loyalty, Amelia got Drugs from the Stan Lee Cameo. She didn't have them when Martinex took her. 
> 
> Also, what to do with a new pack, and some ideas about how a culture of obligate carnivores might work.

The nightmares had come back while she was in the women’s shelter.  But seeing Azul brought them back in full force.  This time instead of just the faceless hands holding her down, she dreamed the smell of death. 

 

She woke with a shriek and was immediately caught and pulled tight to someone, she flailed and panic elbowed someone else.

 

“Ow! Fuck! ‘Melia!  What the?”

 

She froze.  Arms around her, holding her tight.  She shivered all over like her skin was trying to escape.

 

The lights came up.  “Yondu?”

 

“You’re ok, hun.  You’re safe.”

 

“I’m not sure how long I was missing, but it was long enough to mess with those antidepressants I’ve been taking.”

 

Kraglin didn’t let go, but he cleared his throat.  “Been more than a year.  Can you just not take them?”

 

“Ugh!” She pushed her way out of his grasp.  “Clearly not!  Plus, you can’t just stop, there is supposed to be a tapering off.”  She sighed.  “We aren't in Terra very often, and I can’t imagine that they will sell us the drug synthesizer after Martinez shot up the factory.  It would be best if we could meet with the sketchy Russian doctor and get a restock on those.”

 

“You seem fine.”  Yondu said.  “Maybe you don’t need em anymore.”

 

Amelia scrubbed her face and looked at him. “I seem fine because they are working.  But the nightmares and panic attacks came back as soon as I stopped.  I can’t use Xandar regulated drugs, because none of them have been tested as safe for Terrans. I will pay with my own units, if that’s the prob-“

 

Yondu stopped that line at once. “No!  I’ll get em for you, if you need.”

 

“Thank you.”   She climbed out of bed and looked around for pants.

 

“You leaving?” Kraglin asked.  “I think I owe you a favour.”

 

“I can’t be here right now.  I need to work.”  And with that she left.

 

Kraglin and Yondu exchanged a glace.  “You’re gonna have to keep an eye on that or me.” Yondu said.

 

Kraglin nodded.  “I’ll ask Tullk to help with that again.”

 

——

 

Amelia turned on the lights in the med bay and was surprised to see the new pack back in the med bay.  “Everything OK?”

 

Scaphoid said, “There is a shortage of rooms because of plumbing.  Quartermaster Tullk Ul-zyn instructed that we were to sleep here until other arrangements could be made.”

 

“Ok.  Um… that’s OK.  I will just grab a few things and go work in the dining hall.”

 

There was some quiet growling, then Lunate said, “I will come with you.”

 

“No.  It’s OK.  You need to sleep.”

 

Hamate said, “So do you.  You smell exhausted and upset.”

 

Amelia sighed.  “It isn’t really polite to comment on people’s smell.”

 

They all looked at her.  Scaphoid said, “You are pack.  We take care of each other.”

 

Amelia looked at him.  His eyes were the colour of baltic amber and he had a scar where his hairline would be if he had one.

 

“It isn’t really polite to stare.”

 

“I’m trying to learn your face.  My species doesn’t have anything close to your sense of smell.  We recognize people by their faces.”

 

Pisiform snorted.  “People mostly look the same. Within a species,how can you tell one from another by looking?”

 

Amelia had a light bulb moment and must have given something away, because they all looked at her.  “You are all far sighted!  That’s why you need help with moult!”

 

They watched her politely but with out any particular amount of understanding.

 

“it makes perfect sense!  Why evolve fine detail vision when you can smell better than a _blood hound_?”

 

Scapoid cleared his throat.  “You need to sleep.  Brahl says you do not sleep with the pack.  Where can you go so that you can rest?”

 

“I'm kicked out of my room because of plumbing.”

 

Lunate asked, “Do you not sleep with your mates?”

 

“I had a nightmare.  I'm sorry. I should go and let you get back to sleep.”

 

They just all looked confused. Finally Pisiform asked, “You cannot take comfort from your mates?”

 

“It's complicated.”

 

There was much nodding. “It is unusual for us as well,” Triquitrium said. “To have so many males working with females.  Quinlan is…. Upsetting.  It is more natural for one large male to have a harem and the other males to exist in bachelor groups.  One female with six male attendants is … “ he trailed off. 

 

“Are we going to have a problem?”  Amelia asked. 

 

Everyone avoided eye contact.  Finally Scaphoid said, “We will adapt to female leaders if it allows scar free moults.”

 

Amelia considered this. She thought back to the porn of one female to several males and realized she needed to do more research into Achernonian culture.  She collected her book and the sweater she left in the med bay and headed out.  Lunate followed. “It's ok. I don't need you to follow me.”

 

Lunate frowned.  “I am not following. I am guarding. We are guards.”

 

“O…Kay.”  Amelia sat in cobblers pose in the hallway with her back to the wall that was between Yondu's door and Kraglin's.  She started to read about how the Kree had taken advantage of an evolutionary quirk in Achernonian breeding habits to siphon off twenty percent of the population.  They generally took the male pups around the age of twelve when they would normally start to be seen as prey by the adult males. 

 

Then whole thing made Amelia uncomfortable. She had just started reading about the slightly horrific details of the captive breeding program when Lunate’s nostrils flared and he knocked on Yondu's door. 

 

“Piss off!”

 

“The Alpha requires attention.”

 

“What in tarnation are you blathering about?”

 

“Think he means ‘Melia, sir.”

 

“I'm fine!  Go back to sleep!”

 

Lunate whined then whimpered. He shook he head, no, while cowering and looking at the floor. 

 

The door opened and Yondu stormed out wearing his shorts and a frown. Amelia looked at him and realized she maybe over cooking at Sunday dinners.  He was easily up twenty pounds is the last two months. She sighed. “Ok. You go back to the med bay and I'll try to get some more sleep.”

 

Lunate whispered something that Amelia’s translator caught as “Yes, mama.” Yondu jumped like someone had poked him. Lunate fled. 

 

“I guess I'm coming back to bed now.” she said. Then she noticed his face. “What?”

 

“You tell him to call you that?”

 

“No. Why?”

 

“Never mind.  Just come back to bed. You shouldn't be wandering in the dark.”

 

Yondu shoved Kraglin up against the wall to make room in the bed.  Amelia crawled in and Yondu squeezed in next to her. “Good thing y’all so small.  Wouldn’t have room for three other wise.  Want your back rubbed, hun?”

 

“Yes please.”

 

Amelia was almost asleep when she heard Yondu say.  “You can’t let ‘em call you that.  You gotta make that ship stop first thing in the morning.”

 

She manages a “um-hm” before sleep claimed her.

 

——

 

Amelia woke up alone in bed with a splitting headache.  When she got up to pee, Tullk and Yondu were sitting at the table in the room.  She ignored them at first, then had her pee and brushed her teeth.  When she felt vague alive and not death warmed over, she came over and sat down.

 

“This is about Lu calling me mom, isn't it?”

 

Yondu cleared his throat.  “It isn't exactly mom.  It’s what the children in the crèche call the slavers.”

 

Amelia felt sick.  “OK.  So we -I!-  I need to make it clear that isn’t expected.”

 

“It’s more complicated that that, Doc.”  Tullk interjected.  “These boys are all scared up, but the oldest is only 22 and the youngest, Pisiform is 17.  Brahl’s pack has a completely different and stable dynamic.  These boys as still trying to figure it out.  I talked to Stakar.” Yondu clenched his fists but didn't say anything. “They were picked up off a Kree slaver vessel the Ravagers raided five years ago.  They weren’t able to integrate in the clan.  Psychologically speaking, these boys probably could do with a mother figure.”

 

“I’m not sure that my being ten to fifteen years older than them qualifies me to be a foster mom.”

 

“Yur a woman in authority.” Yondu said.  “And, apparently, you already smell the part.”

 

“Oh for crying out loud!  Moult was months ago!  I do wash!  How long are they going to be able to smell that on me?”

 

Tullk considered this carefully.  “I don't know, But it would be helpful if it were to the next moult.  You will need our boys to help with when the Bonies start to shred.”

 

“Look, I know they are thin, but that’s no reason-“

 

Tullk interrupted.  “You gave them bone necklaces.  It is as good of a family name as any.”

 

Yondu remembered his other question, “How you feel about use using the rest of those bones to make commemorative jewelry for the rest of the crew?”

 

Amelia closed her eyes.  “Anything but the teeth.”

 

Yondu grinned.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments please. Posting on the bus. It doesn't always work on my phone. So if this looks really weird our you didn't get all 1500 words, there may be updates in 12 hours
> 
> ETA- nope! This is why I hate posting from my phone. You were missing breakfast. Now corrected
> 
>  
> 
> Ps I suck at knitting


	18. Domestic Disturbance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ogord wants his ship back

The next week was tough.  Yondu was barely letting Amelia out of his sight.  That left Kraglin and crew to sneak around Terra picking up the shopping.  That in and of itself was weird, but apparently Yondu had contacts of earth who would organize supply runs for him in exchange for weapons or drugs or hacking favours from the crew.

 

Amelia in the mean time was dealing with both the new boys and an upswing in her anxiety levels.

 

Finally, she just cornered Zvi and demanded.  “What the hell is going on with the plumbing? And no more dorking me around!  Spill!”

 

“Uh… you should talk to the Cap-“

 

“I am talking to YOU Zvi.  What. The. Hell?  I want my space back.”

 

“It’s supposed to be a surprise.”

 

“I’m in no mood for surprises, but I can fake it later.”

 

“Not enough to fool Tullk and -“

 

Amelia spun and went to find Tullk.

 

He was in the supply room, taking inventory with Brahl’s crew.

 

“Bad Wolf!  What is going on? I know you know.  Now spill!”

 

Tullk just gave her a mildly amused look, but Brahl had the ‘Oh Shit! We’ve been caught look on his face!’

 

Amelia went for the softer target.

 

“Well?” she demanded.

 

“Um.” he said firmly.

 

“This isn't just a plumbing problem, is it?  You are all up to something.  Tell me!”

 

“Captain said not to tell you until we know it worked.” Brahl muttered.

 

“What?”

 

Tullk cleared his throat. “We’re adding a bathroom to your room.”

 

Amelia missed the surprise on Brahl’s face, because she was staring wide eyed at Tullk.

 

“But, we had to reroute everything to make space.  Then we had to start over when we got Terran fixtures while we were there.”

 

“You evacuated the entire 17th floor!”

 

“Well, he didn’t want you to guess.  So, do you want all the details, Doc, or are you alright to wait now?”

 

Amelia sagged.  “I want my room back.  I keep having nightmares that someone is licking my back.   Then I wake up, and it’s just Yondu is snoring in my ear.  I would just go sleep on the Rusalka, but for Some Reason, I no longer have access to the flight deck.” 

 

“You need to talk to the Boss about that one.  He’s afraid you will run.”  He watched as gritted her teeth.  “He is trying really hard to do nice things for you.” Tullk pointed out.  “He is just doing a piss poor job of talking about it.  But this is Yondu, so are you really surprised?”

 

“No.  I guess not.”

 

Tullk nodded.  “While you are here, what are you going to do with The Freedom’s Lady?”

 

“I don’t know.  I thought Yondu would sell it or something.”

 

“I told Ogord that if he fixed things with the drug synthesizer company and arranged delivery of the unit you wanted, I would ask you to sell it back to him.  It has sentimental value.”

 

Amelia looked thoughtful.  

 

“We take delivery of the drug machine next week in Jadoon.”

 

Amelia nodded.  “I don’t want it.  I would just give it back if that would settle what ever messed up bullshit he has with Yondu.”

 

Tullk looked surprised.  “I’ll keep that in mind.”

 

——

 

Amelia was worried about Yondu.  His clothes didn't fit, and while she could understand a bit of weight gain, this wasn’t all over.  She was worried he had a liver tumour.  The weird ass alcohol he was always drinking meant that this was a possibility.  He wouldn’t let her touch his torso and while he had always been cautious with physical contact, this was a whole new level of aversion.

 

And he was back to not being seen with out a shirt on.  Which didn’t hide the fact that they were all pulling across his abdomen.  He also sometimes would jump or wince so she knew he was having discomfort, if not actual pain.

 

She had asked to check him out in the med bay.  He had not taken it well.

 

“I am NOT Sick!” He shouted.  “Ain’t nothing wrong with me!  I’m fine!”

 

She hadn’t asked again.

 

Kraglin had no ideas.

 

The crew had started making jokes about what was she feeding him.  So far, they weren’t stupid enough to make them where he could over hear.  But she did.

 

In the mean time, she was trying to get her routine back. Or at least find a new one.  It was … a little unconventional, but the new boys spent all their time hanging out in the med bay with her.  They were young and unafraid of the technology.  Pisiform picked up suturing like no one’s business.  His stitches were almost as even as hers, but it was disconcerting to watch him licking his lips as he worked.

 

Tullk had organized Ogord, Yondu and Amelia to sit down for drinks at one of the bars on Jadoon.  Mirena had given them a stern lecture about not breaking anything.

 

Ogord had started out by apologizing to Amelia.  She conceded that if she had been a hostage, his actions were still rude, but vaguely understandable.

 

Then she pointed out that she was the one who had ended up suffering because they couldn’t sit down and actually talk about things.  “No!  You have to act like a bunch of four year olds who get up set and take their ball and go home!  This is teenage girl level of petty.”

 

The woman eavesdropping by the bar snickered at that.  Both Yondu and Stakar glared at her.  She smirked.

 

“Someone you know?” Amelia asked.

 

“My wife.”  Stakar said tensely.

 

“Do you want to invite her to join us?” Amelia asked.

 

“We are … estranged.”

 

“Huh.  Another family relationship you threw away rather than talk about things?”

 

Admiral Ogord glared at her.  Tullk cleared his throat and looked at the ceiling.  Yondu didn’t even bother trying to hide a proud smile.

 

“I can see why you two get along so well.” The woman from at the bar said, as she pulled up a chair.

 

Amelia smiled.  “I was actually thinking, I can see where he gets the stubborn from.”

 

The woman laughed.  “Nah!  He was like that when we found him.  Too stubborn to die.”  She gave Amelia a hard look.  “I’m Aleta.”

 

“Amelia.”  She held out her hand.  Aleta smiled politely, but did not take it.

 

“There is a rumour that you killed a Stark.”

 

Amelia stopped smiling.  “Um…. sort of?  It’s a long story.”

 

“I look forward to hearing it someday.  In the mean time, I would like you to return the ship you took -” Amelia started to object, Aleta held up a hand, “- in your escape from your abductors.”

 

Amelia nodded.  “I don’t want it, but it seems like the closest thing I have to leverage to get these two to finally play nice.”

 

“I would vote for play nice.”

 

“Yeah, but you are the ex-wife.”

 

Aleta laughed.  “Yeah, that means I know what buttons to push. There are a hundred Ravager factions.  Ogord is just one.  This has gone on long enough.  Yondu was like a son to me.  I want to be around to meet my grandchildren.”

 

Amelia blushed but didn’t say anything to that.  Aleta laughed again and clapped her on the back.

 

“I’ll give you the Freedom’s Lady if you give me your word that you will get this sorted out.”  Amelia said carefully.

 

“Done!”  Aleta nodded and went back to the bar.

 

Yondu smirked and started to say something.  Amelia put her hand on his arm.  “We are playing nice now, remember?”

 

Ogord smirked right back at Yondu.

 

“Stakar.” Aleta called from the bar.

 

“Everyone gets to practice being diplomatic here.  I know you can do it with clients, so why not try it out on each other?” Amelia suggested.

 

Ogord left.  Aleta brought Amelia a drink.  “He’ll toe the line.  It is just going to take a little while for him to adapt to the new reality.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments are always appreciated


	19. Have a Brownie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amelia has a nightmare

Amelia was dreaming about someone licking her back.  She sort of woke up and rolled over to snuggle closer to Yondu.

 

There was a head sticking out of his chest.

 

She screamed and flung herself back then fell out of bed.

 

Yondu sat up and looked around.  He turned on the lights.  Amelia was huddled in the corner sobbing.  “Hun?  What’s wrong?”

 

“I had the worst nightmare!”

 

“Can you tell me about it?”

 

Amelia took a deep breath.  She switched to English, “ _I honestly don’t even know how to.  You don’t have cultural context for Alien movies.”_

 

_“Pete told us ‘bout that.  Little guy, face like a raisin, right?  Flying bicycles?”_

 

Amelia shuddered.  “ _No. No, not that at all._ ”  She took a deep breath.  “ _OK, you have to understand that this story was written by people who didn’t know there was any other life in the universe and had no idea about space travel the way that you do it.”_

 

_“Go on.”_

 

_“There is this team of miners or something…  I haven’t seen the movie in a while.  They are mining for minerals or something on a asteroid.  They find this ship and some sort of parasite attaches to Gary Oldman’s face.  They think it is going to kill him, but after a couple of days, he’s fine.  Then they are sitting in the kitchen and his chest bursts open and a parasite climbs out and runs away.”_

 

_“Huh.  Sounds a bit like that thing we picked up on Kallu.”_

 

_“No.  That one would just eat you, lay eggs and die, this one would actively attack people.  Any way, it doesn’t matter.  My nightmare was that …  well, I dreamt you had a monster climbing out of your chest.”_

 

Yondu just looked at her.  “You saw a monster climb out of my chest?”

 

“Yes!  No!  I know that wasn’t real, but I was dreaming and it felt real and-“

 

“OK.  Find your pants.  It’s time to go talk to Quinlan.”

 

“Quinlan has been avoiding me since I brought back more Achernonians.”

 

“That’s not why she’s avoiding you.”

 

——

 

Amelia ran the scanner over Yondu for the fifth time.  “This makes no sense.  Male marsupials don’t have pouches.”

 

“Maybe not on Terra.”

 

“Why didn’t you tell me?!”

 

“Din’t know if it would work.  She might not have been able to suck.”

 

“OK, that raises a whole other question, how are you lactating?”

 

“D’know.  Just am.  That’s like asking how yur liver works.”

 

“I know how my liver works.”

 

“Fine.” Yondu snapped. “It’s like asking ME how my liver works.”

 

Amelia turned to Quinlan.  “And you knew about this?”

 

“Not right away.  But Nix told me incase the new carnies let it slip.”

 

The Carpal boys were sitting politely in a corner watching all of this.  Amelia turned to them, “You knew?”

 

Much avoiding of eye contact.

 

“Ugh!  I hate being the last to know.”

 

“Ya ain’t the last.  Haven’t told the crew.” Yondu said.  He reached out and touched her fingers before letting his hand fall.  “You mad I’m carrying som’un else’s baby?”

 

Amelia blinked.  Then she gave a brief nervous giggle, then she just looked uncomfortable. “I have know idea what I’m feeling.  I’m glad Kaur is OK, but…  I …. I have no frame of reference for dealing with this.”  She turned to Quinlan, “What do you think of all of this?”

 

“Well, I guess I’m on the ship now until Princess is either ready to come out, or we get somewhere that have a neo-natal intensive care facility.”

 

“No rush.  I’ll keep her safe.”

 

Amelia ran her hand over Yondu’s belly.  She could barely find the seam.

 

“She mostly sleeps while I’m moving,” he said, “I feel her moving around a bit more in my sleep.”

 

Amelia sighed.  “Yeah, I think I noticed that.  I thought I was losing my mind.” She took a big breath.  “Are you going to be able to give her back when she’s ready?”

 

Yondu tensed.  “What do you mean give her back?  Quinlan is staying on the ship.”

 

“O…Kay…. but…  you will have to give her back to Quinlan.  We can pick up some formula for her and-“

 

“Ain’t feeding Kaur tinned crap.”

 

OK.  Amelia had no idea what to say to that.

 

“Um..” she looked at Quinlan, who shrugged.

 

“I can’t breast feed. It’s been too long.  My milk dried up.”

 

Amelia considered this.  “You could if you wanted to.  We just need to adjust your hormones a little…. It’s something to think about anyway.”

 

Quinlan rubbed Amelia’s back.  “Are you ok if Captain Udonta gets to play father to Princess for a while?”

 

“What?  Yeah!  I mean, of course.”  Amelia froze.  “We gotta tell Kraglin!  Oh shit!  Aleta knew!”

 

Yondu shrugged.  “I ain’t got no secrets from her.”

 

“Ok, what about the rest of the crew?”

 

“That is gonna take some thinking.”

 

“You have got to tell Kraglin.” Amelia said firmly.

 

“Yeah, yeah.”

 

——

 

Amelia needed some one to talk to about this and for once it couldn’t be Kraglin.  She had been very firm that Yondu needed to be the one to tell him.  Fuck.  She was still kind of mad at Tullk for the misdirect.  There was no way he wasn’t in on this.

 

OK.  What this called for was the first ever Knitting Ravagers Stitch and Bitch.  She got her yarn and her sticks and went to find Dave.  This was harder than it should have been because she couldn’t access the flight deck.  Really, all that meant was she had to wait about thirty seconds for some one to come out and then go in through the open door.  The Petrichor was the fifteenth ship on the second row to the left.

 

Dave was surprised to see her.

 

“I need to talk to someone and Yondu and Kraglin are both out of the running.”

“Um… sure?  Come on in.  What’s up?  Did Yondu try giving you stinging nettles this time?”

 

Amelia took a breath then busied herself making tea.  “What I’m about to tell you, it has to stay between us, OK?”

 

“OK.”  Dave hesitated.  “You aren’t running away are you?”

 

“No!  Yondu is…  not pregnant but-“

 

Whatever she was going to say next was interrupted by Dave bursting out laughing.

 

“I’m serious!”

 

“No! No, I know you are.”  He was still shaking with laughter.  “I’m just trying to figure out who won the pool about how long it would take you to figure it out.  I’m sorry Doc, I was betting on three weeks ago.”

 

“You knew.”

 

“Almost everyone knew.  But it was cute watching him try to keep it a secret.  Ow!”  Dave rubbed his arm where she had punched him.  “Sit down.  I’ll make the tea.  Here, have a brownie.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Amelia! This is also how she finds out that Dave makes special brownies


	20. Custody Arrangements

Dave found Kraglin elbows deep in a gyro manifold.  He was coated in hydraulic fluid.  It gave Dave a pause to reconsider his request.

 

Screw it!  The Doc needed her mate, Dave would just have to clean after they left.

 

“Uh… Kraglin?”

 

“Wut?”

 

“Amelia needs you.”

 

“I’s busy!”

 

“Um… I kind of think it’s important.”

 

Something went twang and Kraglin started cursing and he jerked his hands away from the machinery.  Zvi snickered.  “Looks like you’re free to go see the Doc now!”  He laughed, then added.  “I’ll take care of this, just go.”

 

Kraglin followed Dave back to the Petrichor.  Amelia was passed out on the couch.  Kraglin sighed.  “Capt’n has very firm ideas-“

 

“It was only one brownie!  I was being hospitable!”

 

Dave watched as Kraglin knelt down, getting ick on the chesterfield, he noticed.  Kraglin gently jiggled Amelia’s shoulder.  “Com’on, ‘Melia, time to go back to my room.”

 

Amelia looked at him and giggled.  “ _Yondu’s PREGGERS!  Quinlan knocked him up!_ ”

 

Kraglin frowned.  “That was just one brownie?  Fuck!  That new strain you’ve been working on is dangerous dude!”

 

“Um!” Dave said firmly.  “My Terran is crap, but… that is actually true.  Sort of.”

 

Kraglin frowned at Dave. “Wut?” he asked, puzzled.

 

“Uh….well….um… Yondu’s been carrying Quinlan’s baby around in his pouch all this time.  But we aren’t supposed to know… or,  you know, know that Quinlan is a girl.”

 

“Woman.” Kraglin corrected absentmindedly.  “Well, how does that work?”

 

“Damned if I know,” Dave replied.

 

“Well, that don’t make no sense!”

 

“ _I want my knitting!_ ”

 

“I’m not giving you pointy objects until you can speak common again!” Dave insisted.

 

“ _You are so mean!  Don’t you love me any more, Dave?  I got you out of prison, remember?_ ”

 

Dave frowned, “I didn’t follow that one.”

 

“It’s OK,” Kraglin said, just scooping Amelia up off the couch.  “I’ll take her back to my room and tuck her into bed.”

 

“Probably a good idea.  It sounded like she didn’t get much sleep last night.”

 

——

 

Amelia woke up; she was still in her clothes, which were now covered in handprints that were both sticky and oily.  Looking around, she recognized Kraglin’s room, which meant no shower, but Yondu’s room was just next door.  OK.  She could manage that.

 

“Are you OK now?”

 

Amelia jumped.  She hadn’t noticed Kraglin watching her.  “I’m fine.  I’m all sticky and smelly but fine.  What is this stuff?”

 

“Is Yondu really pregnant?”

 

“Um… it’s a bit more complicated than that, but yes.  For another month at least.”

 

“Huh.  There a pool on how we find out?”

 

“Kraglin, this are our crew.  Don’t be ridiculous!  Of course there was!”

 

“Who won?”

 

“Peter.”

 

“That little shit.  I bet he cheated.” Kraglin thought for a moment. “You OK with this?”

 

Amelia shrugged.  “I wish he would have just TOLD me that.  Looking back, I can see where he sort of hinted at it, but I didn’t know that was a possibility.  I didn’t pick up on it.  Did you know this could happen?”

 

Kraglin shrugged, “I knew that’s how it worked with Centaurians.  Dint know they could …. Adopt.”  Kraglin paused.  “How do you think the crew will take it?”

 

Amelia yawned.  “I need breakfast, the brownie didn’t count.  After a wash.”  She crawled out of bed.  “It sounds like most of the crew already knows.  You boys gossip like washer women.  They didn’t eat Quill, and that was before we started to think like a family.”

 

Amelia took her time in the shower.  It was a tiny shower, but Kraglin wasn’t a bulky guy.  Whatever goop he had gotten on her, it was nice having someone to wash her back.

 

“There is a rumour that I am getting a private bathroom with a tub.”

 

“Is there?” Kraglin asked as he licked the water off her neck.

 

“Care to comment on that?”

 

Kraglin kissed her hard, so that she wouldn’t ask him again.  He picked her up and carried her out of the shower.

 

“You are deflecting.”

 

“Yup.”  He carried her towards the bed.

 

“Table!  The bed won’t dry by tonight.”

 

Yondu chuckled from the other side of the room.  “Now aint that a pretty sight.”

 

“Yondu!” Amelia called.  “How’s our little lady doing?”

 

Yondu rubbed his belly.  “She’s fine.  Sleeping now, I think.”

 

Kragln asked, “Is this real, or you conning me, sir?” He set Amelia on the table in front of his captain and went to find some towels.

 

Yondu unbuttoned his coat and opened his shirt. He waited until Kraglin had handed Amelia a towel.  “Give me yur hand.”

 

Kraglin did.   Yondu thought for a moment then pressed the man’s hand against his belly.

 

Kraglin did not shriek and yank his hand back, but it was a close run thing.  “I have eight sisters.  Six of ‘em got knocked up before I left home.  That is always some creepy ass shit.”  He pulled his hand away slowly.  “How’s this gonna work?”

 

Amelia shrugged.  “That’s up to Quinlan.  Another few weeks and Princess will be ready to go back to her momma.”

 

Yondu frowned.  “I got her.  She can stay with me.  Quin’s gonna be busy at work and-”

 

Amelia was looking at him.  ‘That has to be Quinlan’s decision.  Princess is her baby.”  Yondu did not look happy at that statement. “Look we’ll figure it out.”

 

\-----

 

In the end, it was Amelia and Quinlan who figured it out.  The boys were just told how it was going to be.  Yondu was listed as the father on the birth certificate, with Quinlan listed as the mother.

 

Most of the crew already knew, which took a lot of the thunder out of Yondu’s big announcement.  Those who didn’t bowed to peer pressure to not say anything.  No one wanted to piss off either the Captain or the medic or the woman who was sleeping with a pack of carnies.

 

Yondu stopped wearing a shirt and it only took a few, non-fatal stabbings for the crew  to stop staring when Princess would peek out of his pouch.  Amelia considered that a win.

 

Amelia got her bath tub.  Tullk was immediately put in charge.  No one saw the three some for a couple of days.

 

By the time Princess was ready to go back to her Momma, Amelia had gotten Quin lactating again.   Quinlan was ecstatic, but it was Nix who made a point of thanking Amelia.

 

“You don’t know how much this means to her, Doc.  It lets her feel like a proper mom, after Princess has been away so long.”

 

Yondu was not ready for Princess to go back to her momma.

 

Amelia had the housekeeping team clean out another storage room, She and Quin set it up as a big nest. Quinlan and her six and Amelia and her two all slept in a big pile for a month, with Princess in a sort of demilitarized zone between Yondu and Quinlan.  It gave everyone a chance to get used to the idea the Princess would be sleeping with her other parents soon.

 

Yondu still insisted that he take her for afternoon naps.  He and Quinlan had baby holding priority.  Their respective mates were grudgingly allowed to be the second string.

 

Nana Aleta came for a visit as promised.  Kraglin managed to avoid laughing too loud when Princess spit up on Papa Stakar.  Aleta didn’t.  She laughed in a way that suggested this incident was going to be gossiped around once she got back to her ship.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One chapter left.
> 
> I signed up for a writing challenge and, sadly, that has been taking my time. Unfortunately, it won't be published until December but it will be 15000+ words in about 10 chapters and will feature Kraglin's tattoo.
> 
> Comments are always welcome.


	21. Rings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yondu finds his earrings

Amelia had started the literacy training project to teach the Carpals how to read. Her tiny little classroom of eight didn't last very long. These days it was closer to forty and she was teaching in the dining hall.  

 

She had expected to have rowdy students, but surprisingly they were all really well behaved.  Part of that was she refused to talk over anyone.  Cross talk resulted in the student being asked to leave.  If you wanted to be in class you could damn well pay attention. She taught for between an hour or two every day. It was always just after the breakfast rush, while she still had the patience to do it. 

 

This meant that she was predictably out of the med bay for at least an hour every day.   Which is why Hamate was so surprised to see the Captain dragging the First Mate into the treatment room right before class. 

 

Under the circumstances, he was even more surprised to see Amelia in the dining hall. “Is everything ok with Kraglin, Sis?” he asked as he came through the doors. 

 

“Yeah. Why?”

 

“Only I just seen him going into the med bay with Captain Udonta.”

 

Amelia stared blankly at him for a second, then bolted out the doors.  She made it to the med bay in record time and found a half naked Kraglin.  This was not completely without precedent.  She also found Yondu digging through the supply drawers. 

 

“Oh, hi ‘Melia,”

 

Yondu whipped around and looked guilty holding a set of loop forceps. 

 

“What are you doing?” she asked flatly. 

 

They both were avoiding eye contact. 

 

Amelia walked forward and yanked the instrument from Yondu's hand. “These were sterile.  Now I have to do that again.  Now. If you tell me what is going on, maybe I can help. Otherwise, get out and stop making a mess that I will be on the hook to clean up.”

 

Kraglin and Yondu shared a look.  Then Kraglin sighed. “He's gonna pierce my nipple.”

 

Amelia frowned, “Why?”

 

Yondu dug in his pocket and pulled out something that he handed to her. Amelia took it and looked at what was in her hand. It was three little gold hoop earrings. 

 

“I want Kraglin to wear one too.”

 

“Ok. We are talking about a full thickness puncture.  I'm willing to bet you didn't even wash your hands. So, how about you let me do this?”

 

They nodded. 

 

“OK.  Which one are we doing?”

 

Kraglin thought about this for a moment.  “The right one, so it’s over my heart.”

 

Amelia gave him A Look, then got out the scanner.  She looked surprised.  “Ok.  The right one, over your heart.”

 

Amelia got out a surgical kit. She did some actual prep with antiseptic and suddenly Kraglin was really glad she was doing this instead of Yondu.  It wasn't as though she wouldn't have found out.  

 

“Do you want me to warn your first?”

 

“Well, I - OW!”  Kraglin took a deep breath.  “That weren’t so bad.”

 

“I didn’t feel a thing.” Amelia deadpanned.  “But that was just the piercing, we still have to get the ring through.”

 

Kraglin looked looked down.  There was a piece of plastic through his nipple. ”What the hell is that?”

 

“Back home we called it an _ IV catheter.” _  Amelia looked at the earrings “All these are different.  The smallest is likely too small, so which of the other two do you want?”

 

“He’ll take the biggest one.” Yondu snorted.

 

“Are you OK with that, Kraglin?”

 

“Yup.”

 

“Ok.  These aren’t really nipple rings.  You will have to be a little bit-”

 

“Ow!”

 

“-careful with it until it heals.”  The clasp was fiddley, but secure.  Amelia managed to get it closed with only a little whimpering from Kraglin.  “OK.  You are done.  Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a class to teach.”

 

“How’s that going, by the way?”  Yondu asked.

 

Amelia handed back the other two earrings.  “It’s OK.  We keep picking up more students.  Most of the crew knew the common alphabet, but the class size grew when we got past simple words.  Then it grew again when we got to simple sentences.”  Amelia sighed, “And, of course the crew has turned it into a reading competition.  It would be ridiculous, except that it seems to be working.”

 

“I want you to have these.”  Yondu said, trying to hand the earrings back again.

 

Amelia nodded, but didn’t take them.  “OK.  But I would feel better if you gave them to me sometime when I didn’t just catch you in the med bay.  I need to know that you really want me to have them, not just that you feel pressured to give them to me because Kraglin has one.”

 

Yondu put his hand down.  He did not say, ‘I don’t fall for that coercion bull shit!’ but he thought it.  The thing, he had learned with the Doc, is that she sometimes had a funny way about her, you needed to sneak up on that emotional stuff.  If it couldn’t be ‘I’m fucking you, just understand what that means and don’t make this complicated,’ there was no way she was going to understand ‘just wear the damn earrings and everyone (including you) will know what that means.’

 

Why did she have to make this so damn complicated?

 

He nodded; she left.  Kraglin looked at him and said, “Captain, we have a couple of Terrans on board.  You could always ask about mating rituals.”

 

“You go do that.  Let me know what you find out.”

 

\----

 

Kraglin listened politely to Andrei, but decided there was no way Amelia was going to promise to love, honour and  obey the captain.  Not with a straight face, anyway.

 

Peter had a more sketchy memory, but was very clear that Amelia needed a big fluffy white dress with “sparkles and lace and crap.”  This was not helpful.  He was also very clear, that they needed a priest and Yondu would have to give her the ring in front over everyone.  And there need to be a “speak now or shut up about it” part, so that someone could interrupt and steal the girl.

 

Kraglin’s head hurt by the time he was done talking to Peter, but that was about standard for anytime the boy got on a kick about Terra.  He had been briefly intrigued about the part where Peter had said Yondu needed to go down on Amelia when asking her, but he had quickly corrected himself to “Down on one knee!  He has to go down on one knee and ask for her to marry him!”

 

That was less interesting.

 

Plus, he couldn’t see Yondu kneeling for anyone.  Not with his history.  

 

Dave had been to Terra, but wasn’t generally invited to weddings.  Kraglin asked if he had ever just turned up.  Dave replied with a firm, “No.”

 

Because keeping a secret on the Eclector was almost impossible, Kraglin wasn’t entirely surprised when he was approached by Tullk.

 

“Did the Boss ASK if she would marry him?”

 

“Um… sure?”

 

“No, Kraglin.”   Tullk sighed, “That can’t be the assumption.  He has to flat out ask properly.  ‘Will you marry me?’  It has to be clear.  Then if she says yes, I’ll help organize a wedding.  I was married on Terra before; I’ll keep you from making too much of a mess of it.”

 

\----

 

Amelia was eating breakfast in the dining hall.  She was only half paying attention to the not oatmeal, mostly she was reading the manual for the drug synthesizer that had been finally delivered (thanks to Admiral Ogord) last week.  She became aware of Yondu standing across the table from her.  She looked up.  He was glaring at her.

 

“What?” she asked.

 

“Will you fucking marry me?”  He demanded.

 

“....yes?”

 

“Good!”  He stomped off.

 

She looked at Peter, who beamed and gave her two thumbs up.  That was weird.  She went back to her oatmeal like substitute.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much FourNostril for beta reading for me!


	22. The Ravagers Plan A Wedding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much FourNostril for the beta read! This chapter is much improved by your input!

Peter kept insisted on the fluffy white dress.  Tullk was arguing that the dress didn’t matter.  Quinlan just shook her head.  “Wouldn’t she have had that at her first wedding?  Maybe we should do this so it doesn’t reminded her of that?  She has that pretty dress from the itchy skin plant place.  Would that work?”

 

Yondu was just happy to have a reasonable suggestion, so he voted with Quinlan on that one.

 

The negotiations about attendants were fairly easy.  Quinlan and Princess would be on Amelia’s side and Kraglin and Peter would be on Yondu’s.  Tullk was going to perform the ceremony.

 

“Wait!”  Yondu panicked.  “What ceremony?”

 

Peter rolled his eyes.  “Dude!  You stand up in front of everyone.  She walks in, in her NOT FLUFFY dress.  Then Tullk talks about love and crap and they you each promise to love each other until you bite it.  Then you give her the ring.  Then you may kiss the bride.”

 

“More or less.”  Tullk said.  “Do you think we should invite Aleta?”

 

The room went quiet.

 

Kraglin finally said, “Her and ‘Melia get along good.  Aleta’d be happy we asked her.”

 

\----

 

It took weeks to organize everything, during which Amelia was kept busy trying to transition Princess back to Quinlan.  It was the perfect cover.  Quinlan kept her distracted.  

 

Yondu was laying on the floor one night, watching his little girl sleep, wondering what the hell he was doing.  He felt Amelia’s hand on his shoulder.  She never touched his back, while she was awake.  He enjoyed the sleep cuddles where she spooned him more than he cared to admit.

 

“Yondu?  It will be OK.  Quinlan will take good care of her.”

 

“I know that.  I just got used to having her around is all.”

 

“She’ll still be around.”

 

“I din’t know I wanted kids ‘til I was carrying one.”

 

Amelia did not say anything about Peter.

 

“This would be a completely different operation with a bunch of little squallers running around.” Yondu continued

 

“You would have to let the women on board actually be women first.”

 

“I know that.  If I do, there’s gonna be a couple of the guys who will want to be women too.”

 

“Would that be so bad?’

 

“You wanna see Oblo in a dress?”

 

Amelia giggled.  “If it makes him - HER happy, sure!”

 

“Fuck.”  Yondu lay there quietly for a moment.  “How many I got?”

 

“Fifty three.”

 

“That many, huh?”  He thought about it for a moment.  “Yeah, OK.  As long as they still gets the work done.”

 

\----

 

Aleta had some concerns.  “A surprise wedding sounds like a terrible idea.”

 

“I did ask first,” Yondu groused.

 

“Did you ask if she was ok with you planning the whole thing?”

 

Yondu just glared at her as he cut the coms channel.  Then he went to find Amelia.  

 

“You ok if I plan stuff?”

 

Even deep into studying for her next medic exam from Xandar, Amelia noticed Yondu being cagey.  “What stuff?”

 

“You know…. Mate stuff.  I thought we could have Aleta over to meet Princess.  I could introduce you as my mate… official like.”

 

“Yeah.  Ok.”

 

“You sure?”

 

“Yup.”

 

“Peter figures you want a fluffy dress, Quinlan says you can just wear that pink one from the gardens.”

 

“It’s a formal event?  Ok.  I’ll even wear the silk slip you got me under it.”

 

Yondu’s brain shorted out a little.  “That’d be nice.”  He put his hands on that spot on her waist that she liked, “You ain’t gonna be mad I’m planning this?”

 

“No, it’s fine.  Just wait until after my exam next week, ok?”

 

“OK.  Anything else you want?”

 

“Is Kraglin going to be OK with you introducing me as your mate?”

 

“Yup!  He and Peter are gonna stand by me.”

 

“OK.”

 

“Thought we’d have Quinlan and Princess stand by you.”

 

Amelia nodded, “Yondu, I know it would mean a lot to Kraglin if you acknowledged him too.”

 

“I’ll….” Yondu paused. “You want that?”

 

“Yeah.  But it has to be your decision.  Well, you and Kraglin.  Just… talk to him about it, OK?”

 

“Alright.”  Yondu kissed her forehead.  “I got this.”

 

\----

 

Tullk cornered Amelia studying in the med bay.  “What are you going to give to Yondu and Kraglin?”

 

“Hmm?”

 

“Doc.  You need to pay attention for a moment, this is important!”

 

Amelia turned off her textbook and pushed it aside.  “OK.  You have my full attention.”

 

“Yondu’s giving you earrings and Kraglin is planning something.  What are you going to give them?”

 

Amelia looked a little panicked.  “I didn’t know I needed to!  I don’t have anything planned!”

 

Tullk sighed.  “You want me to make them something?  I can metalsmith.  Terrans give their mates rings, right?”

 

Amelia shook her head.  “A ring is a good way to lose a finger with the stuff they do.”  She thought for a moment, then pulled off her coin necklace.  “Could you polish off the face side and laser etch my fingerprint or something on instead?”

 

Tullk grinned. “Yeah.  That would work.  One each.  I can even find some chain for them to wear them on.”

 

“Thanks Tullk.”

 

He hugged her tight for a moment.  “Now.  Back to work.  You have a big exam coming up.”

 

“Sure thing, Bad Wolf.”

 

\----

 

Tullk felt a little guilty, but he was living up to his Bad Wolf nickname.  He had made the necklaces all right.  Amelia had come down to his shop and provided him with her right thumbprint for the back of the boys’ pendants.  He had finished them up as requested.

 

Then he made another disk.  Not a coin, a platinum disk the size of one of the coins.  He etched her thumbprint on one side and her portrait on the other.  Her looking off into the distance wearing that happy little smile she got while she was problem solving.  He hung it on a chain around his neck.  Long enough that it hung near his heart.

 

Then he went to work on the bracelet Kraglin had asked about.  It was silver coloured, but had a tracking device in it.  He worked a little bit of Asgardian science into it so that the pattern would move.  Kraglin has just asked for something pretty.  Tullk had done that, but he had used his recombinant DNA as the pattern.    It twisted and dances as it shimmered through his DNA patterns, through those of his unit, through those of his weapon.  If the woman ever came across an Asgardian, she would be protected.

 

Asgard owed him a favour.  At some point, he was going to collect.

 

\--

 

Dave and Amelia were laughing and knitting and generally just relaxing after the last round of exams.

 

Quinlan came in carrying Princess.  “Aleta just got here.  Come on!  I’ll help you get dressed!”

 

Amelia looked at her.  “Is that today?”

 

Dave rubbed her back.  “If you don’t want to do this, it’s OK.  We just tell Yondu no.”

 

“No, no, it’s fine.  I just wasn’t sure when she was coming.”

 

Quinlan nodded.  “That’s why stuff is so hard to plan out here.  You kind of have to be flexible about then your guests arrive.”

 

“Yeah.  I get that.  OK.  Let’s go make me pretty.”

 

“I’ve got some flowers growing in the garden.  I’ll go pick some.”

 

“No Poison Oak, OK?”

 

Dave grinned.  “I wouldn’t have made that mistake!”

 

Amelia smiled back at him.  Then her face fell.  “Um… Dave?  I’m giving Yondu and Kraglin those coins you found for me.  I hope that’s OK.”

 

“I am so happy to be part of this, Doc.  It’s fine.”

 

On the way from the Petrichor to her room, Tullk intercepted them.  “Look, I’m not expecting any trouble, but you never know with these things.  I’m lending you my best gun until this is over.”  

 

Amelia looked puzzled.  “You want me armed?  I have a -”

 

“I am lending you my blaster.  Just take it and be safe, OK?”

 

Amelia shrugged.  “OK.  Thanks Bad Wolf.  I’m not sure it  goes with my dress.”

 

Tullk shrugged.  “I don’t really care about that, but if you were the holster low on your hips, it will work as a belt.”


	23. The Wedding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to FourNostril

Amelia was all dressed and ready to go, but Quinlan was insisting they wait for someone to come get them.  Dave turned up with a bundle of lilies.  Eventually, Andrei turned up, all neatly trimmed.  He offered Amelia his arm.  “I’ll walk you down.”  

 

Amelia smiled and just went with it.  Andrei was an old fashioned gentleman sometimes.  The dining hall was already full when they got there.  Amelia attempted to just take a seat in the back, but Andrei had a firm grip on her arm.  He lead her to where Aleta and Tullk were having a whispered spat at the other end of the hall.  Aleta won as they approached and Tullk went to stand next to Quinlan with bad grace.

 

“Ummm…” Amelia started.

 

“By the ancient and barbaric practices of Terra, what fool gives this woman away?” Aleta demanded.

 

“What?” Amelia asked.

 

“I know!”  Aleta responded.  “What kind of bull shit is that?  But apparently, it’s a thing.”

 

Andrei cleared his throat, “I do give this woman away.”

 

He let go of her arm, hugged Amelia tight for a moment and looked at her with tears in his eyes. “Be happy,  котенок .”

 

Amelia hugged him in a daze, then turned to look out at the dining hall.  The whole crew was squished in there, but The Carpals had front row seats, looking proud.  Dave was off to the side looking teary.  Yondu and Kraglin had their dress uniforms on.  Stakar was standing in the corner, looking awkward.

 

_ “Holy shit, I’m getting married!” _

 

Kraglin shoved Yondu, “ _ You said you asked her, Captain! _ ”

 

“ _ No!  It’s fine!  I just wasn’t expecting it, you know, now.  Um…  I don’t have a speech prepared or anything.” _

 

Yondu grinned.  “ _ You’ll do fine _ .”’

 

Aleta frowned.  “Is everything alright?”

 

“Yeah.  This is just the traditional Terran pre wedding shoving match.”

 

Aleta didn’t look convinced, but Amelia smiled at her, and Peter shoved Kraglin with a grin.  There was a brief scuffle from the audience as the Ravagers joined in.  Aleta sighed, “Terrans have some unusual customs.”

 

Amelia gasped.  “ _ Oh gods!  The traditional open bar! _ ”  

 

Peter went pale, “Crap!  _ I forgot that part! _ ”

 

“ _ Good! _ ”

 

Aleta sighed, “How long do we have to let the ceremonial shoving match go on?”

 

“That should be enough.”  Amelia answered.

 

Yondu bellowed, ‘Knock it off!”  Everything screeched to a halt.  Ravagers absentmindedly straightened their uniforms.

 

Aleta gave a speech about marriage as a joining of two souls, figuratively.  There was a weird bit Amelia didn’t follow about how marriage should never EVER be the literal joining of two souls, with much glaring at Stakar, who looked embarrassed.  Then she talked about commitment and protecting each other and then Yondu was talking.

 

“I promise that you will make me stupid on a regular basis.  That I will panic when you is missing, that I will kill for you when needed.  I pledge myself and my arrow to you.”  

 

He rubbed her earlobes and handed her the two mismatched hoops she had seen earlier, then turned and glared at the crew.  Amelia put in the earrings and Aleta beamed.

 

Kraglin stepped up.  “I promise I will try to help when you make him stupid.”  Amelia and most of the crew chuckled. “That I will comfort you when you panic, that I will hunt for you when you are lost, that I will stand between you and all the harm in the world, even when that means Yondu.  I pledge myself and my ship to you.” He pulled out a silver cuff bracelet and clipped it over her right wrist.  The patterns Amelia had thought were etched it in, flickered and changed, so that the surface seemed alive.

 

Then they were all looking at her.

 

Crap.

 

Tullk handed her the necklaces.  

 

She turned to Yondu, “I promise to love you, even when you are stupid.” This got a laugh, “That I will care for you and whatever children you suddenly bring home.” Quinlan patted Amelia’s back.  “That I will work hard to keep you and our crew alive even when they insist on licking things.  I pledge myself and my needles to you.”  Then she stood on her tiptoes and fastened the Canadian Penny necklace around his neck so that the leaf was showing.

 

Then she turned to Kraglin.  “I promise that I will listen with an open heart when he is keeping secrets from us. That I will support you when you need me and try to be the soft place for you to come home to.  I pledge myself and my needles to you.”  Kraglin had to bow slightly so she could fasten the Denmark 50 Ore necklace around his neck, with the heart side showing.

 

Standing close to Kraglin, she didn’t notice that Tullk had put his hand over his heart when she was saying her pledge.  He watched, his glittering eyes locked on her.  Stealing the bride was almost traditional.  That was part of why he had armed her.  Yondu had Old and Blue all wrapped up and the lilies from Dave were new.  With his borrowed blaster, she would have everything covered.  He didn’t need to be the thief at the wedding.  He could wait.

 

Yondu turned to Kraglin.  “You may be an idjit, but yur my idjit.  I pledge myself and my arrow to you.”  He thumped Kraglin in the chest.  There was a collective muttering from the crew.  

 

Kraglin looked at Yondu, “Aw, Captain!  You have my loyalty.  I pledge myself and my ship to you.”  He clipped something around Yondu’s wrist.  Amelia looked hard and realized it was half of the handcuffs she had been wearing when Yondu had bought her.  The other half was on Kraglin, the links had been removed.

 

She gasped and flung herself at them.

 

Aleta cleared her throat.  “Apparently, I have to ask if anyone objects to this union.”  She glared at the assembled crew.  “Last chance, speak now or shut up about it!.”  Andrei leaned in and whispered in her ear.  “No!  That’s stupid!” Aleta contradicted,  “Why would I say or forever hold your piece?  I don’t want the objectors running around armed!  Last chance!  You hate this, you can leave with me.  No?  Fine.  I declare you married!  Now, kiss!”

 

Kraglin went first.  He put his hands around her waist, leaned in and kissed her gently but passionately.  After a moment, Yondu tapped him on the shoulder and stepped in. He dipped Amelia and made her laugh, then kissed her aggressively.  The crew burst into applause.

 

Music wafted out of the PA system and Peter started clapping slowing, keeping time with the music.  The Ravagers joined in.  Then, by some signal that Amelia missed most of the crew flattened themselves against the walls.

 

“What is this?”  Aleta asked.

 

“The Wedding Dance!”  Peter beamed.  He walked into the centre of the room where the officers were loitering, gave a four count and the crew eased into the electric slide.  Amelia laughed and hugged Yondu.

 

He shook his head, “What have you done to my crew, woman?”

 

“She made us her family.”  Kraglin answered.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK. That's all for this series for now. I'm taking a couple of weeks to write the prequel of how Kraglin joined the Ravagers (after Yondu picked up Peter, if you have been reading the comments, you will like have already read the summary.)
> 
> However, that work will be released in December as part of the Kragdu Big Bang. I believe it may have some illustrations.... not totally clear on that part.
> 
> Anyway, I still like these characters, so I expect to have some more short stories set in this universe. So, subscribe or check back.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments please.


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